Traveller: Gate Wars
by walkir
Summary: In 2155, a Terra struggling in a series of interstellar Wars finds the Stargate, moves to Abydos and kills Ra before venturing out to the Galaxy, exploring the gate network and finding new allies and enemies from both universes. This is SG-1 as it plays in the Stargate Milky Way, using series material, and Traveller as it uses GURPS:Traveller Interstellar Wars. M for language.
1. Chapter 1

**Traveller: Gate Wars**

_The material presented here is a fan fiction of my original creation, set in the __**GURPS TRAVELLER: INTERSTELLLAR WARS**__] setting from Steve Jackson Games. This material is not official and is not endorsed by Steve Jackson Games._

The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright 1977 - 2011 Far Future Enterprises.

The other part of the story covers the Stargate Universe, though without Stargate:Universe.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Stargate, Stargate: SG-1 or anything associated with it. That all belongs to MGM and SciFi Channel or whoever might own it at the moment.

NOTICE: THIS STORY MAY BE DISTRIBUTED FREE OF CHARGE BUT MUST NOT BE SOLD OR EXCHANGED FOR FINANCIAL RETURN IN ANY FORM.  
-COPYRIGHT/DISCLAIMER NOTICE-  
The full disclaimer will be located at the end of this story. However, be it known that I own nothing and expect to get nothing because the rights are owned by others. Only certain characters and technologies are mine and these are the creation of the author who is solely responsible for them as such. Neither Studio is responsible for the content of this story.

THIS STATEMENT MUST ACCOMPANY „TRAVELLER: GATE WARS" IF DISTRIBUTED. THIS STORY IS FREE OF CHARGE AND MAY NOT BE SOLD OR EXCHANGED FOR FINANCIAL RETURN IN ANY FORM. THIS DEDICATION MUST ACCOMPANY ANY DISTRUBUTION OF THIS STORY.

**Prologue**

**Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

**Ca. 16,000 BC**

Shaguri's troop had been hidden in the Moala Mountain range for weeks now, and the gods had not been seen for even longer. Shaguri was happy: There was enough to eat, they could sleep at a dry place and this area had good stones for tool making.

He was sitting in a shallow cave overlooking the plains to the horizon, as suddenly a strange sound emanated from the rocks above him, followed by a rock slide that missed him by only a few meters. As he looked up, he noticed a new small cave had appeared, and two… things looked out. They carried staffs, and their heads - which glowed in the sun and were carried by long necks - had sharp beaks like no animal he had ever seen. Climbing out of that cave, they looked over the plains, until they finally noticed him and began to speak in a language he had never heard before. Their whole bodies seemed to be made from the same shiny material as their heads.

Several others started to send balls of fire from their staffs that created a way out of the mountain by enlarging the cave.

**Thirty kilometers away from the Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

**At the same time**

###Z-27V online

Huge energy spike detected in grid 8347-45K9-7785.

Checking energy signature against database… checking... chec…

Alpha override.

98.45% match to artifact B01. Meson comm.: online, send alpha alert: B01 found at 8347-45K9-7785. Alpha alert, use full force applicable.

Disintegrator one: online.

Disintegrator two: online.

Follow up Plasma fire, several salvos, emanating from fourteen contacts resembling species G-AK3 to 40%, 30% G-AW4, 30% no fit. Registered as species G-AK/W1. Ten contacts of species G-V7 nearby. Alpha alert message updated, 18V checking in, arriving in 5 minutes at the latest.

**Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

**A few minutes later**

"My Lord" Hel'mak suppressed a sigh as he looked at the obviously shocked boy clad only in furs sitting near them "I do not think this world is worth our effort, that boy doesn't speak any civili…" he looked up as a ray of sunlight was mirrored into this eyes. He lowered his staff and turned around to face it, as suddenly, three Horus Guards just… disappeared. As did his master. He noticed the two specks in the distance: armored boxes that simply had no right to fly let alone at the ludicrous speeds the magic in his helmet showed them going at. For once, this information was easily picked up, if not exactly useful. A whole part of the mountain's flank next to him just disappeared, as did something above the gate.

"Out! Get out! Retreat!"

Shaguri ran, praying in fear as he saw the gods appear – he had never seen more than one of them! – and destroy the strangers.

He simply ran, hoping to hide again, inform his troop and find a new hiding place. He would never get a chance to do so.

Only Hel'mak made it through the gate, even as a disintegrator hit cost him an arm and staff that was the last thing passing the gate before the wormhole collapsed.

**Fifty kilometers away from the Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

**At the same time**

###Z-00V online

Alpha override detected. B01 found.

All units, authorize full strike.

Warbot Z-00V got an order it had waited for ever since its construction in the final war, more than a quarter of a million years ago. After all those eons, it finally reactivated the extra dimensional storage magazine, loaded the first missile into its integrated launcher and armed the multi-megaton warhead.

###Target acquired.

3…2…1… launch.

The first missile left the warbot while it already prepared its last two shots.

**Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

When Shaguri looked up at the sky, he noticed something shiny, small, coming to the mountains, he even noticed the gods fleeing, and that sight would have given him something to think about if he had been able to live just an hour longer.

**250 kilometers away from the Moala Mountain range**

**Vland**

**At the same time**

Enlardi had been happy ever since the god that had spotted him on his risky hunt sped away to the mountains in the distance.

Now he was carrying enough meat to feed his family and Gaarirra for two days.

Suddenly, a wave of white, hot light appeared behind him, nearly blinding him. In short order, two waves of the same type hit him, followed by a shockwave that moved trees and rocks over a vast area.

When he finally looked back, he was awed. Where once had been mountains reaching into the clouds, there was only a single, titanic cloud formed like a mushroom and reaching higher than the mountains ever had.

The plains near the cloud burned, and no tree in more than a hundred kilometers distance still stood, while boulders and ash rained from the sky.

Then, he heard the sound he had learned to fear since he was old enough to think. The gods were coming.

He ran, but stopped involuntarily after a few steps as he tripped over something. Looking down, he saw a strange helmet with a beak, half molten and of an unfamiliar material. Next to it, there was an amulet carrying a strange symbol buried in the ground.

He took both, although he never knew why he did it, and ran for his life again, forgetting most of the meat.

But even as he became his troop's shugilii, Enlardi would never forget the strange helmet, the amulet he gave to his future wife, the sign of Ra and how the gods disappeared for months, only to be seen in the sky where once Moala had once been.

_There are constant mentions of the fist of a god in early Vilani myths, legends of total destruction and an ever occurring word: Moala. All hints point to the Ishimaga province on Vland, which shows signs of an extinction event, and interesting concentrations of rocks that seem to belong to the same geologic structure, but there is neither a mountain, nor an impact crater. The Ishimaga inland sea, while evidence, is in no way big enough to be the result of such an event._

_But the most important evidence against it is the simple fact that there is no extinction event that would inevitably have been caused by this._

_Where were the millions of tons of material that would have blocked the sunlight? No, there was no ice age and therefore no destruction of a mountain range or something like that._

_Fringe opinions like the Vilani "gods" simply being ancient warbots and fighting the ash are as ridiculous as calling the Terran pyramids a landing site for alien spaceships or locating Atlantis on Prometheus. _

Document registered in the Argushiigi Admegulasha Bilanidin, written down in 1250 V.I. (2163 AD)


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter one**

**Gate CIC, Sol gate facility**

**Mare Moscoviense, about 3,700 kilometers from Luna City**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**June 10, 2155**

Major Juan Maria Littlefield was looking at the cave the Terran Confederation had excavated five kilometers below the lunar soil, and connected with what had become a fast growing base. At the moment, everything centered on the utterly dwarfed artifact located in the center of the half kilometer diameter room.

It was a ring about 8 meters in diameter with nine chevrons spaced evenly, sitting on a platform that floated two meters above the ground on contragrav emitters. Its inner ring was covered with symbols, which according to the scientists, were star constellations.

A pedestal covered with the same symbols had been sent to them by the Government from Prometheus for reverse-engineering, but HQ hadn't been willing to allow a test until the device's function had been replicated on the lunar base.

Supposedly, a series of a hundred computers (originally intended for command bridges) in a control center a few klicks away had been necessary to simulate the device, and R&D was already all over its function to revolutionize computing. Both bases used the same multiple fusion reactors salvaged from imperial ships crippled at the liberation of Procyon to power the ring.

According to Dr. Rodriguez who had been essential to deciphering the gate, this was a gate into space. Another one had been found on Prometheus and they had deciphered the address taken from the Earth gate's cover stone. Curiously, the Promethean gate hadn't had a cover stone, but no one knew what this meant for the address taken from it.

If it was a gate that let someone step directly from Luna to Prometheus, it would free up a lot of starships for the main routes to Procyon and Agidda while allowing the oldest Terran colony to grow and overcome its industrial issues, massively helping in the war efforts.

The wars against the empire had started before he was even born, and he had not been able to get to know his uncle lost in the first fights over Barnard. The whole world had been in turmoil back then. When StarLeaper One, the first Terran ship that could beat Einstein, had brought home news about the empire in 2098, Terra had been shocked. Sure, the European Union had colonized Prometheus and started several other generation ships, but as jump drive had been invented, people had hoped they could colonize the galaxy and escape a Terra still partially suffering from the wars of the early 21st Century.

Instead, they were blocked by the Ziru Sirka, the "Grand Empire of Stars" a vast, nearly prehistoric polity spanning thousand of stars and reaching far coreward that had consolidated its borders around 500 AD. Its population consisted nearly solely of humans that called themselves the Vilani.

There had been some communication with the empire for the first decade, culminating in the incident that would become the First Interstellar War. The American base at Barnard's Star had been one of the few points of contact between the two polities, and it offered the reason for war everyone had expected.

An utterly trivial border incident on Barnard ended with the US Space Force attacking imperial civilian ships violating their space. As an imperial punitive expedition jumped in, not all Terran ships returned fire, and especially the Europeans - a contingent from Bundesraumwaffe, Ejército Del Estrellas and Armée de les Étoiles - had held back. The Vilani, however, did not care about internal Terran politics, and destroyed the national fleets as well as all Terran bases on Barnard.

At home, the loss of all those lives led to major changes. Space fleets - the only arm of military still under national control - were put under unified command in less than five years, just in time to beat back a second punitive expedition at Barnard, earning Terra an armistice. Directly after these events, both Luna and Prometheus had become full UN members, the organization evolving into the Terran Confederation.

In his early school years, the empire attacked again, only to be stalled at Agidda. This would be the last major attack for years, as the "war" only led to skirmishes and his re-enlistment after he finished his four obligatory years of public service in 2126. The skirmishing kept on through the 2130s when he participated in many boarding actions and slowly worked his way into an officer position.

As soon as HQ realized the enemy was distracted, they attacked the most important world: Nusku, an earthlike world with vast resources, and most importantly, vast shipyards supported by all the industry and technological treasures more than a billion Vilani could support.

Naturally, the invasion failed. But history books praised the action, as it earned the Confederation another armistice and a chance to research, reverse engineer and rearm.

For years, the Terran part of humanity had a chance to grow and research, finally closing most of the tech gap between them and the empire, commissioning many new classes of ships incorporating the strange metal found at the former colony of Prometheus.

Of course, the empire did not sleep either.

When they attacked in the mid-2140s, nothing could stop the imperial juggernaut, led by a competent commander for the very first time. Finally, in 2148 they nuked Terra, killing hundreds of millions. Then, the Vilani had to withdraw because of internal politics. Terra rebuilt and used its chance.

Since 2148, they had liberated all of their former territory, and the preparations for the third attempted invasion of Nusku were well underway.

With Terran survival at stake, no one considered things like studying the objects found in Egypt and on Prometheus worth the necessary money, even if they were made of one of the strange Vilani hull materials. However, once the Secretariat of the Terran Confederation had been convinced that this was a device that could allow instantaneous trips to another world - Prometheus for starters, but if you could move it or there were other objects like this… it changed everything.

Now, they were just waiting for the doctor that had convinced the governments of both the Confederation and the still young Republic of Luna – which was hoping for the economic boom such an installation would definitely offer – to fund this base and the mission to arrive in CIC. Everything else was ready. The two grav probes next to the gate were already loaded with as much scientific, espionage and ECM equipment as their contragrav units could handle at 2G. The probe was expected to arrive at Prometheus, but there still was a chance they would end up somewhere else.

All the command personnel surrounded the main holographic screen, which at the moment presented a close up of the gate and floating probes on its three-dimensional display that, at more than 18 square meters, was bigger than a flag officer's quarters on a starship. 2D screens underneath presented technical information about the structure.

A moment later, the door to gate CIC opened and a very beautiful woman entered, wearing a Colonial Bureau uniform and glasses. Her curly raven black hair was bound in a long ponytail. "Please excuse the delay, General, I was enthralled too much by my work..."

Just at that moment, the speakers came to live. "Reactor ready level in one minute, prepare for gate activation."

The distinguished old General took the fixed microphone. "This is General Li, prepare for activation." He nodded to her "Let's hope you're right and this is worth it, doctor."

Just then, a hatch in the ceiling of the cave opened and a heavy particle accelerator bay accompanied by two missile racks, all of which had been stripped from a starship which had been headed for the bone yards, folded out of it. While those aimed at the structure, grav tanks in the tunnel leading from the baser proper to the gate room prepared for any action considered necessary.

The airlocks to those tunnels closed and soon after, the address found on the Egyptian cover stone was dialed. Suddenly, the floating gate shook briefly before the CG units could compensate and keep it perfectly upright. All of a sudden, a whirl of blue erupted from the gate.

Stunned silence filled the Command Center, until a single question broke it. "What happened?"

"Sensors show something we have never seen before, sending the data to the physics department."

Dr. Rodriguez just stared at the data sent up from all those devices. "Incredible… This has to be a wormhole… But what's that whirl?"

"Do you think it's secure to proceed, Dr.?" General Li asked and she immediately nodded.

"Yes, Sir. I don't see why not."

The probe lowered itself a few meters to the height where the whirl had been, and was now replaced by what looked like a lake under a light wind. It moved slowly into the gate, gaining speed, finally disappearing.

Everybody held his breath as suddenly, the CIC's main display changed to project a map of what the empire called the eight by ten parsec Sol Subsector and zoomed out to show the Subsectors of Sol, Dingir and Arcturus. There it stopped and presented the position of the probe at an unknown system 14 parsecs away… trailing.

On the classic screens underneath, astronomical data collected by explorer ships scrolled down. This system looked promising.

"Well, this is not Prometheus…" one of the officers murmured, but this was even better.

The map clearly showed the borders to the Ziru Sirka, showed the freshly moved Vilani military headquarter world of Dingir, the contested system of Nusku, the trailing three parsec gap that had cornered the Confederation for longer than the telescope had been known on Terra… and the blue blip clearly behind it, located on what looked like one of the important jump-mains usable by even the simplest starships in a region that had at least fifteen worlds easily reachable by Jump-2, including two additional minor mains.

Whoops sounded all over the CIC and wherever scientists had looked at the data, but they died down as soon as someone switched to the probe's holocamera and a new picture appeared.

It was dark, only illuminated by the event horizon of the gate. But more important were other values on the screens underneath: The air was breathable; Gravity inside the comfort zone for people born on Terra and the temperature was survivable, while a bit on the warm side. Switching to low light mode, the probe started to rotate its camera turret to locate the Stargate and its pedestal. The gate symbols did not match with the ones found on the Earth gate or the Prometheus gate, but as the symbols on the Prometheus gate did not match the Earth one, that was to be expected.

Two rows of columns extended from the gate for several meters, forming a tunnel wide enough for a G-Carrier to fit between them. Unfortunately, this was followed by steep stairs.

Sensors showed they were barely big enough for air/raft operation.

Floating forward, the probe soon arrived at the stairs, but one thing had to be tested before an expedition could begin. Extending its robot arm, the probe threw a small camera drone into the gate. It disappeared, never to be seen again, although everyone in the facility waited for a full five minutes. There wasn't even any telemetry. Apparently, it was just… gone.

While people in the CIC waited for telemetry, further checks of the strange location took place, including throwing a small camera grenade with an integrated thermite self-destruct system up the stairs, which sent home information about a vast desert behind the next long row of columns before self destructing.

After another twenty minutes of collecting data about the building and the curious ring structure built into the ground, the probe just turned around and dived into the event horizon. A moment later, the gate disengaged.

**Gate room hangar, Sol gate facility**

**Mare Moscoviense, about 3,700 kilometers from Luna City**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**August 30, 2155**

It had taken over a month to process the data gathered at that first mission, to prepare a team of volunteers and to get the equipment for a longer stay while archaeologists all over Terra were fruitlessly searching for the address back to Earth.

Now the Marines were just waiting for Dr. Rodriguez to arrive, as everything else was ready. The three enclosed air/rafts in the best camouflage the Confederation could provide were floating in the hangar next to the gate cave, already loaded with a lot of scientific equipment, enough material for a forward base, food for two man-years, a starship grade water recycling system, tacsuits, and enough weapons to fight a small war - they even carried a single diagnostic bed in case they would have to survive without a way back.

"Major Littlefield? Isabella Rodriguez, I'm ready to go." She was wearing a standard issue marine tacsuit, carrying another set of scientific equipment that apparently did not fit in her contragrav supported backpack next to her gun. Her helmet was mounted on the belt, showing her long raven black curls bound in a ponytail.

"Ma'am." He nodded "I assume you know how to handle your gun?"

"Well, they gave me basic infantry training, but I doubt it. My draft time was administration, and I was to busy looking over the data about this new world. The only things we're really sure about is that the other gate is not on Prometheus, and is much older than we imagined."

"So you better keep clear of the gun." He nodded, trying not to think about the problems this gate could create if it could connect deep into Ziru Sirka Space or to worlds with even more dangerous enemies…

Suddenly, a voice pierced the silence in the big cavern "Reactors ready level in one minute, prepare for gate activation."

Littlefield opened the hatch to the nearest air/raft.

"Well, that means we're ready. Kawalsky, O'Neill, Ferretti! Everybody mount the rafts!"

The hangar's airlocks closed after the vehicles had passed them into the tunnel that lead to the gate cavern and moved above and behind the gate while the same address as the last time was dialed from the pedestal now located in a pressurized and well defended room outside of the depressurized cavern.

The General's voice came over intercom "Recon team, you have a go. We'll dial back in 24 standard hours to see if you need anything, but you will have to find you own way home."

"Aye aye, Sir."

For a moment Littlefield grabbed the little pendant he had inherited and which brought him luck wherever he went.

"O'Neill, go on." Slowly, his air/raft rose to gate level, and moved into the blue "lake".

The universe stretched in front of them, it felt like a rollercoaster, and when they left the other gate and came to a sudden stop, most of them had to suppress the feeling of upcoming vomit.

When they emerged, the autopilot immediately made room for the other two vehicles, while hovering between the columns and double checking the probe's readings via the onboard sensor suite.

"Atmosphere is breathable, Sir."

Slowly, the vehicles moved up the stairs, leaving the building and hiding in the dunes around it. Soldiers climbed out to hide them under extra camouflage nets, but just stood there dumbfounded.

"What's the problem, Ferretti?!"

"Sir, you better have a look at it for yourself…"

Littlefield climbed out and looked at… a pyramid above what looked a like an ancient Egyptian temple, complete with two obelisks, framed by three moons. "What the fuck?!" Activating the camera integrated into his armored sunglasses, he wished he'd brought his easel with him… only to be interrupted by Dr. Rodriguez.

"I was correct!" she climbed out of the air/raft, now wearing her helmet and constantly filming the building. "Or at least it's a big boost for my theory." She stated apologetically. Still, she continued making a voiceover about architectural facts over the records she had begun as soon as she saw the structure.

Meanwhile, Ferretti and O'Neill were preparing an automatic gauss grenade launcher with a few camera grenades. Mere minutes later, twelve grenades raced into the air, sending their data back to the vehicles. On their screens, a small map of the area appeared, and soon there was a single point about four klicks away marked. Just a moment later, the grenades' thermite self-destruct charge went off, destroying them.

After Ferretti stored the grenade launcher in the back of one of the rafts, Dr. Isabella Rodriguez, Lieutenant (MC) Amanda LeClerc, who was a French military multi-talent for everything scientific and Major Littlefield with Sergeant Kawalsky climbed in, with Corporal Singh manning the terminal of the Gauss Light Support Weapon mounted at its back.

Slowly, the team drove closer to the place, and what they found was astonishing. It was an open pit mine under a gigantic tent, and hundreds of humans and strange animals manually worked in it with nothing more advanced than simple animal powered machinery to be seen, while several lines of workers stretched out from it in several directions. In the distance, there were about half a dozen similar tents surrounded by a variety of large rock outcroppings, and the rows of people implied even more. There also were a lot more spires in the distance.

"The ancients seeded humans here, too?"

"Apparently" Dr. Rodriguez nodded. „And I want to meet them." She climbed out and went down the hill behind which they hovered.

Raising an eyebrow, the major stood up "LeClerc, Kawalsky, you're with me."

They jogged down the way to the nearest mine, closing up to the doc fast. As they arrived, no one was working any more and a young man came closer, clearly enthralled by that strange beauty in front of him. As Littlefield stepped forward to confront him, the major's pendant bounced out of the front pocket he had stuffed it into, so the closest of the men could see his family heirloom.

He turned around, shouting "Na tu de-why-ya. Na tu de-why-ya!" and all of a sudden, all the humans in the mine fell in to the sand, lowering their faces while the motion rippled down to all the other mining sites.

"Na tu what?" his anger forgotten for the moment, he quizzed his linguist, who only looked like she had no idea how to communicate. "Come on Doc, you're the linguist."

Swallowing, she nodded and began "Well, apparently the gate was found in Egypt, so we might try ancient Egyptia…"

"Just do it, doc."

Sighing, she turned back to the people and signaled that young man to rise, trying to communicate with him in several different languages before turning to address an old man who managed to do more than stutter. All of the soldiers had to suppress a grin as they looked at the red faced young man, who turned even redder as he noticed beautiful blonde LeClerc looking directly at him.

Realizing that, she stepped aside, donning her helmet and closing the visor to analyze some of the ore pieces found in a primitive basket nearby. "Sir!"

"Yes?"

"Seems we hit the jackpot, that's the second part of the Vilani hull alloy we didn't manage to find yet."

This shook everyone to the core. Not only had they found a way to expand to trailing, away from the Ziru Sirka and boost their industrial muscle, but apparently the Confederation would finally be able to close one of the last remaining parts of the technology gap between them and the empire.

A boy ran away soon coming back with several men leading a beast as big as an elephant carrying an open sedan.

Out of this wooden throne rose an old man clothed in more elaborate, partially oriental looking tunics, looking at the mean and coming closer while speaking in that odd language. He bowed to the Major and as he spoke again, the people raised themselves up, some young women bringing them water.

The young man was now near Dr. Rodriguez again, looking determined not to act like a fool near this obvious authority person. Smiling, she reached for a bag and took out a candy bar from the Marine Corps issue ration packs, offering it to him while listening to the man. "Sounds a bit like the Berber language…"

Skeptically, he took the offered food and tasted it. Soon, he smiled at her, turned around and said something to the old man, offering the bar and letting him taste it, too. It seemed to be late in the local day, and people were preparing for ending their shifts, so the old man signaled them to follow him.

Nodding, the major took his communicator out of a pocket and spoke into it in a low voice. "We'll follow the natives. Stay close to us, but out of sight. Rafts Alpha and Beta, remain at the base camp."

Minutes later, they were on their way to the front of the nearest, long line of people and their strange domesticated animals moving into the desert. After hiking for a few hours, the four of them stopped while the old man kept walking. "Oh. My. God."

**Nagada, Abydos**

**14 parsecs trailing of Sol**

**August 30, 2155**

In front of them was a massive stone wall, at least ten meters high, with hundreds of buildings behind it, some of them even taller than those walls. Scarce vegetation was seen in front of it, but there seemed to be no obvious temples, pyramids, obelisks, tombs… or anything but houses made of clay up to seven or eight stories high.

They started to film everything again, as they moved into the crowded, narrow streets through a giant gate complete with sentries moving on several wooden bridges. Their first thought was medieval, but soon they realized old Jericho or Babylon would be vastly more correct.

After a few minutes they reached a kind of town square full of hundreds, if not thousands, of people, and the old man seemed to present them to the crowd. Suddenly, all the people fell to their knees, a motion rippling out from the place into all the streets. Just then, furs were taken away from a big bronze disc hanging high over their heads on the central place - showing the eye of Ra.

"Ra?" Rodriguez was dumbfounded. „What is the Eye of Ra of all things doing on this desert hellhole?"

Coughing, Littlefield reached at his pendant and looked at it, being as dumbfounded as her. "At least now I can hazard a guess why they were so welcoming…"

"What do you mean? Oh." She answered as he presented the pendant to her. "Why do you wear that, anyway?"

"I got it from my grandfather, who got it from his grandmother who got it from hers. It has been bringing me luck ever since I got it. It helped me get a few dates, and now… I mean – we found a Vilanium mine and a stepping stone towards trailing!"

"Vilanium? Major, this is abundadida ore."

"Abundant ore?"

"Abundadida ore. This is the Vilani name for the metal. Trinium is called Alukgagzusi."

"Yeah, and we call it Trinium. This stuff here is commonly known as 'Vilani hull metal 2', which sounds even more ridiculous than the Vilani name." he pondered on that for a moment "and sounding more retarded than Vilani is an accomplishment indeed."

"While Abundadida doesn't have the certain ring on it, there's also a scientific name. It's called Barnardium in my files."

"Barnardium?" thinking about it for a moment, he nodded. "So we're naming the hull metal after the victims of the first war. Sounds fair." suddenly, his comm. came on as a horn sounded. „What's the matter, Carter?"

"There's a massive sandstorm coming up, sir. I'll have to shut down the CG and seal everything."

"Understood. We'll stay behind the city walls."

"Understood."

Closing the connection, he went on "So they think we got a connection to Ra…"

"Well, obviously. Maybe they think we are messengers of their god…"

"Some kind of angel? Oh, come on."

Just then, the people motioned them to follow into the inner courtyard of a building, where a big, strange dinner like out of some Bedouin novel was prepared. They ate bread, strange fruits, the flesh of something looking like a reptile and other things, most of them fortunately at least looking like cuisine from other confederated worlds or imperial imports. Still, they had to suppress a fair amount of disgust at the expectation of hot spices going to burn them, and each of them shortly looked at his helmet, which included some kind of ration paste dispenser...

As soon as the women loosened their suits and LeClerc took of her helmet, showing blonde hair flowing over her shoulders and onto her back, they were besieged by young men. While LeClerc grabbed for her Gauss Rifle, the young man Rodriguez had talked to at the mine approached, carrying something to drink and banished most of the others with a few harsh words.

"Hey doc, he's called dibs?" Kawalsky grinned, only earning a blush before concentrating again on the dancing native young women.

After dinner, Rodriguez stood up and stepped in front of the apparent leader, pointing to the sign of Ra before starting to write it into the sand. Before she could finish it, he stopped her somehow making clear this was forbidden, seeming as if he felt he was tested.

Then, the old man rose again and gave orders. Suddenly, all the old women on the yard stood up, grabbed the Major, and carried him away. He tried to protest, but nothing helped him, and as he did not want to attack them, he allowed himself to be brought into another room.

For Major Littlefield, it was strange, and boring. The women had transported him into a different room, brushed his short black hair, used what looked like delousing tools, gave him perfume, improved his shaving… Now he sat on the bed, left alone by them. As he could use some time to think, he didn't protest.

Apparently, people here thought he was a messenger from their god, a responsibility he could not stand to carry, but as long as they could not communicate, there was no way to reject this idea. This was no luck at all. He could not reject the Vilanium and finding a way behind the gap, but the pendant itself now only seemed to produce trouble. And what did those grandmothers style him for, anyway?

Steps came closer, and he sighed. So much for time to think all of this through. As the clothes that posed for a door were taken away, he started to protest, until he saw who entered.

It was a girl wearing a transparent veil. She was no older than maybe twenty years. Long, dark curls framed her delicate features, dark eyes and full lips. Underneath the veil, she wore a simple tunic that was much better than what the people at the mine had worn, and now he remembered that she had brought him his water and had walked back near him.

Without a word, she began to step out of the tunic, presenting her ample breasts to him.

'I just hope she's legal…' shaking his head, he immediately stood up and dressed her again, trying not to touch her in an inappropriate way. "No, no, you don't need to do this. You're hot, but I don't need a virgin sacrifice or whatever this is intended to be…" he said with a reaffirming voice.

She looked at him uncomprehending while he brought her to the door… and as he opened, he noticed shock and fear in the eyes of the old man, who threw himself on the ground and seemed to fear punishment for picking a bad girl… or whatever it was for.

She started to say something, most probably how he rejected her and while the background, his team looked at him, noticing how all the people moved away from their weapons as if they feared punishment, too.

He gulped. "No, no, everything's fine, she's fine, we'll go back in…" immediately he closed the door and brought her back in.

She placed herself at the bed and looked at him, clearly confused.

"Okay, what shall I do now…" he took a seat on the bed also, pointing at himself. "Juan."

She still was confused and repeated "Juan."

He also repeated it, pointing at himself, and then she seemed to understand and pointed at her chest with a little smile. "Sha'ala."

"Sha'ala." he smiled, too. "That's a beautiful name."

**Basecamp, Abydos**

**Two klicks from the gate pyramid**

**August 30, 2155**

In the air/rafts near the pyramid, it was silent. Grounded only a few meters apart because of the sandstorm, there was nothing the ten marines inside could do.

Suddenly, a klaxon went of and the soldier's HUDs lit up, presenting a big contact approaching the pyramid slowly, creating lightning between the two objects. Mass readings where off the scale, the hull composition was similar to Vilani hulls. That wasn't the strangest thing however, as it was apparently lowering itself directly onto the pyramid.

"What kind of ship is THAT?!"

"Database draws a blank, unstreamlined vessel of… POINT EIGHT MILLION displacement tons?!"

Stunned silence.

"Recheck that…"

"Already did it twice, Sir."

"But that's like… forty Dreadnoughts?"

"We subtracted the pyramid at about two hundred thousand dTons, but still, more than half a million…"

"Look at all this surface area! We're in EMCON, aren't we?"

"Yes, Sir. Besides, radio communication is impossible, as everything's jammed. We're as low powered as possible; just the LASER link to beta raft is online, and even that is jammed."

"Okay, Lieutenant. It seems the storm is calming down. Apparently it came from their landing."

Over the next few minutes what appeared to be windows lit up and parts of the hull moved into other positions before their passive sensors detected the first people leaving the pyramid were spotted. Dumbfounded, they looked at the video feed: Humanoids with helmets looking like animal heads with glowing eyes, wearing clothes, being partially bare-chested and carrying staffs.

Then, a bay door opened and two raptor-like fighters left the bay. Hull composition was the same as the mothership, and they accelerated fast. From that alone, they guessed it would deliver a confederated air superiority fighter a hard fight. Still, it looked kind of fragile.

**Feasting grounds**

**Nagada, Abydos**

**August 30, 2155**

"Did they just gift him a girl?!" LeClerc asked Rodriguez dumbfounded as the young woman entered the chamber they had sent the Major to.

"Perhaps it's their idea of sacrificing a virgin?" Kawalsky smiled, earning a disapproving stare from her. "Not. Funny."

"I'm sorry, Ma'am." He immediately apologized.

"It would fit into the primitive looks of this world…" Rodriguez commented, and at just this moment, the door she had just walked through opened, the Major and the girl standing there.

"Well, that's more than I expected of him." LeClerc smiled. "Chivalrous old bast… what the hell?"

The people around them were obviously shocked and scared, covering, kneeling and looking at their weapons fearfully, while the girl started to talk fast.

Gulping, he brought her back in and closed the door, resulting in a lot of relief.

"Well, you don't reject gifts, do you?" Kawalsky grinned, then stating in a serious tone "He didn't strike me as someone to take advantage of such a situation, anyway. Although I wouldn't say no if they presented me one of the dancers…"

"Which is why they don't do it, Sergeant."

"More like because I don't have such a pendant, Lieutenant. I wonder what this old Egyptian stuff's doing here, anyway…"

"As do I." Dr. Rodriguez stated. "Let's see if they know more of them." She grabbed for a pocket in her uniform and took out her military issue perscomp, loading a representation of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.

She presented the Eye of Ra to the young man, who averted his gaze. "No, no, look…" then she presented him a few others, saying their names with a questioning look.

Just as he started to say something, a sonic boom hit the city.

**Bridal chamber**

**Nagada, Abydos**

**August 30, 2155**

"Look"… Juan knelt on the ground and placed the pendant there. Sha'ala immediately lowered her head, but he stopped her. "No, no. Look."

Pointing between him and the pendant, he shook his head. "Not Ra", repeating it several times until she seemed to understand. Then, he took the pendant away and pointed to the seal of the Terran Confederation on his uniform, as it was too difficult to draw in the sand. "Terra. Not Ra. Terra." He then drew the anchor and stars into the ground. „Marine. Juan Terran Marine."

She looked confused again. "That doesn't mean anything to you, does it?" he sighed, opening the front pockets of his tacsuit, grabbing for one of his MREs with the confederated seal as he noted a suit patch with the symbol they had deciphered as the gate symbol for Terra. "Now, that should be better…" smiling, he placed the patch on the ground and said "Terra." He then took something from the room, pointed at it, pointed around and placed it away from the patch, while she nodded, pointing around them. "Nagada. Abydos."

"Well, this is going better than expected…" he smiled; this girl was obviously smart as well as a looker. He then drew a Stargate and pedestal next to the symbol for Abydos, and she nodded. After a while, he painted the Terran gate… without the pedestal. As she tried to add it, he stopped her, shaking his head. "No. No… oh, come on, I have to learn this stupid language!" She started to draw again, but before he could stop her, he braced himself. She wasn't trying to add a pedestal this time, but a gate symbol. "Abydos." She stated and he nodded, taking a photograph with his armored cam glasses.

Curiously, she looked at the glasses, and he smiled, activating them and starting a slideshow of the photographs he had just taken and a few pictures from green landscapes in Spain, him in uniform in front of a forest or the sea, giving it to her and placing it on her face.

Astonished, she took it off again, looked at it from all angles, then smiled and placed it on her nose again as he restarted the slideshow.

"Terra?"

"Terra."

A few minutes later, he had somehow gotten the idea across that while he was from Terra, Ra came from somewhere else. Placing his gun on the pendant, he managed to get across that he would fight Ra.

Sha'ala was surprised, but smiled. She then kissed him on the cheek, whispered "Sha'ala Terra", making signs for "to see" and "to go". Before he could answer, she lowered her tunic again, and the city was suddenly hit by a sonic boom.

Cursing, he took his gun and pendant, running out of the room, only to see the raptor-like shape of an atmospheric fighter crossing the city again. Horns sounded, and everyone yelled about Ra.

„Sitrep!"

„Two fighters just flew over the city, we could get some footage, unfortunately it's not very useful." Kawalsky answered, sending his commanding officer the footage from his armored sunglasses.

Next to them, Sha'ala, who now wore his glasses like a necklace, talked excitedly to the old man who came to them, asking "Ra?"

"No." Littlefield shook his head, taking his helmet. "No Ra. Fight Ra." He took his rifle and pointed it at the fighters. "Nothing happened with Sha'a…" the young woman came over and kissed him on the cheek again, leaving him stunned for a moment and resulting in giant grins from the young locals, with the marines suppressing a chuckle.

"Okay guys, get ready to defend this place. There has to be infantry on the way! At least that's what we'd do. Carter, prepare to support us."

Fearful, the old man tried to push the gun away, shaking his head forcefully, babbling something unintelligible. Meanwhile, the young man they talked to at the camp was discussing with Sha'ala, before he went to the doc.

"Juan." She stressed "No… fight." she indicated a knife cutting open her throat, pointing all around her, before looking pleadingly.

The boy was apparently trying to communicate the same thing to the women.

Hesitating just a moment, Major Littlefield took his Rifle and shot a burst of twelve bullets into the next wall, causing the natives to make room for the four armed Terrans. "Greet them at the gates!" he shouted, mounted the underbarrel micro-missile launcher on his rifle and loaded the launcher.

While he did this, Dr. Rodriguez grabbed him by the arm. "Major, do you really think we should fight them? We are only a dozen, they have fighters and there will be more where they came from. All an attack would do is make them burn the city and kill us … if we're lucky and aren't captured and tortured."

Kawalsky joined in „Sir, they have air superiority, maybe even heavy units. We are only a dozen, have no anti-tank or dedicated anti-air weapons, no chance for reinforcements and Terra is already in a war we aren't winning. I strongly suggest we do not add another one on top of it and get all these people killed in the process, Sir."

Littlefield stopped. "You're right, you know. But I want everyone prepared in case they do attack, Sergeant."

"Sir, yes, Sir!" he nodded and donned his helmet while Littlefield looked to Sha'ala. "No fight just yet."

She smiled again and was visibly relieved. "Okay, we'll await their ground pounders. Everyone into the buildings."

Shouldering their weapons, the four Terrans moved into a different building each, while the boy and Sha'ala stayed at the side of the Doc and the Major, respectively.

Sitting on the sand that covered the floor of this particular building, Isabella Rodriguez presented the next batch of hieroglyphs to the handsome young man in front of her, before accidentally hitting a button and activating the speakers. As the metallic voice began to read the hieroglyphs, the boy looked up. "-pah-rief?"

"Tah-pah-rief? You mean…? You know that?" she pointed at the screen, smiling. Then she realized something. "Now that's a help, thank you…"she stopped "Oh. Hell. I haven't even introduced myself." She pointed at herself "Isabella." His gaze followed her fingers, and she laughed as she realized were she actually pointed. "Men. Would you please look up?!"

Her fingers wandered up, resulting in an embarrassed, if cute, smile from him. She blushed herself a bit, repeating "Isabella. I'm Isabella, and you are…?" pointing to him with a questioning look while she asked.

Realization dawned and he pointed to himself. "Ska'ara."

"Skaara?"

"Ska'ara. Isa'bella? Bella?"

She laughed "Yes, okay, you can call me Bella. Okay Ska'ara, let's get back to work. Mind if I record?" she asked, preparing her perscomp to create a translation program.

**Random house**

**Nagada, Abydos**

**Three hours later**

The major rested himself near a window overlooking the central place, weapons and all other equipment ready. In the hours the soldiers had needed to reach Nagada, he had managed to talk a bit to Sha'ala, and both of them had been glad to receive the news that the doc and the young man were creating a translation program for their perscomps, as communicating via sign language was tiring and lost a lot of the meaning.

Now, a row of twenty humanoid soldiers with helmets looking like animal heads with glowing eyes apparently made from Vilanium had entered the central place, and he could get a good look at them while their leader talked to the old man. They wore clothes made from what looked like some sort of cotton, were partially bare-chested and carried staffs as well as other things, having a vaguely snake-like form like nothing he'd ever seen before in armored gloves made from the same material as the helmets and decorated with gemstones.

He wondered what kind of vision enhancements these helmets might provide, and hoped whatever enhancements the enemy had wouldn't detect them, as the only word he understood from their speech was troubling enough: Ra.

Several young men entered the place, carrying baskets full of Vilanium ore and placing them in front of the strangers. The first of the humanoids knelt down, apparently analyzing the material before standing up and barking an order.

Soon after, the baskets were placed in a circle of stonework hidden under the sand, as suddenly a small craft of perhaps fifteen displacement tons appeared, hovering over the place. As it's ventral hull opened up rings dropped down to the stone circle.

With a flash, the baskets disappeared and left only bare stone behind in the circle. As soon as this was done, the rings moved back into the craft which moved to a building near the city walls and started to do the same thing several times.

He didn't really notice what had just happened. Teleportation. He had seen a ship that wasn't even big enough to enter jumpspace teleport the entire contents of this stonework. Not even the sand had been left on the ground.

While his mind raced, he was more than happy to have recorded all of it. R&D would simply go insane. First the computing device, now this. Perhaps you could even link Luna to Terra with it! The Vilani looked downright primitive if compared to these guys…

And this was an extremely frightening thought. Vilani technology worked on known principles, only refining it further and including millennia of optimizations. Teleporting technology, on the other hand, had been considered outright impossible by all the eggheads. Terra's upward struggle had just become a lot steeper, and even if they beat the Vilani… He had to report back and inform HQ. And that meant making sure these guys did not notice the Terran gate was active again. He was pretty sure the Luna facility could deal with infantry, fighters and tanks, but they simply had to have warships, and if this tiny craft was any indicator, the Navy would have a very hard time.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter two**

**Random house**

**Nagada, Abydos**

**Half an hour later**

The strange soldiers were still standing at the town square, as one of them grabbed a young woman standing near the guards by the hair, pulling her of into the street in front of the house Sergeant Kawalsky was hiding in.

"Oh no. No, you don't." the sergeant lowered his helmet visor, raising his standard issue gauss rifle - just in time to notice the stranger lead the girl into his hideout, closing the door. This ended any doubt he had about blowing the mission to save the local, as being found was nigh inevitable now, anyway.

Sighing, he sneaked down the corridor, rifle in firing position, kicking open the only other door at this level. For a moment, he looked at the beaked metal head. Then, he pulled the trigger. The only sound emanating from him was the sound of three rounds designed to pierce Vilani body armor going straight through the offender's neck.

As the corpse collapsed, his helmet malfunctioned and folded back into the uniform.

"Now, _that's_ an odd hel… what the hell?" securing his rifle, he noticed black eyes covered by a strange membrane surrounded by a spray of dark freckles. "Yeah. That's just _great_. It's a damn Spook!"

Next to him, the girl looked at the dead soldier, eyes wide in fear and shock, so he motioned her to be silent, opening the visor again and talking to her in a reassuring, low voice, ready to suppress her scream if necessary. "Everything's okay… No one's gonna hurt you… damn, doc, get us the language files…"

"Kawalsky, what's the matter?" his comm came to life. "What do you need a translator for? Can you see the Guard that moved in your direction?"

"Sir, the situation's FUBAR. I had to kill him as he came way to close and tried to… have his way with a native just a wall away from me."

A groan came over the comm. line.

"Sir, did you expect me to watch?"

"No, of course not. Okay, any redeeming features?"

"Depends, sir. Even a low powered three round burst at point blank was a bit of overkill, but there's enough of the head left to have a look… That helmet had a strange mechanism to fold itself into his uniform. But we have another problem, Sir. It's a sleepwalker."

"A sleepwalker? A freaking Anakundu?"

"Yes. It's different from all the sleepwalkers I have seen at Junction, though. Not pale like the main character from a stupid vampire movie for starters, looks more like he got a good tan. Also has a strange membrane over the eyes…. Those are still black and surrounded by freckles, though. Sending footage."

"Received. I'll have a look at him later." Lieutenant LeClerc chimed in. "How's the native doing?"

"She's still in shock. At the moment, she hasn't started screaming, fainted or whatever. I'll keep an eye on her. Do they miss him already? Anyone heard my shots?"

"No idea. Okay, that girl is your responsibility now, Sarge. And now… tell me about his equipment." The major ordered

"Aye, Sir. As I said, the helmet is folded away, so I can't tell you much about it. It's in the footage. The clothes are of some natural material, no synthetics. It's apparently some kind of space cotton. There are Trinium bracelets, this massive collar, but no boots. These guys seem astonishingly poorly prepared for the desert, even for ceremonial tax collectors…" smiling reassuringly to the young woman that seemed to slowly relax as she stared at her savior talking to thin air in front of her. He grabbed the staff, testing its balance a bit. "Their weapon seems to be okay as a quarterstaff. But if this is a ranged weapon… Let's just say this has to be the worst ergonomics of a ranged weapon I have ever seen. And I don't see anything else that could be one. Also, I doubt they give their collectors only a staff before sending them in a city full of people perfectly capable of using simple melee weapons. Let alone those collectors just grabbing a girl at random while expecting to be able to deal with her family and survive…"

**Alpha raft, Abydos**

**Two klicks from the gate pyramid**

**At the same time**

Cursing, Corporal Mathew O'Neill turned around to the other marines in his air/raft after sending all the footage they had so far to the team in the city. "Guys, we have a situation. Kawalsky just killed one of those armed guys who was in the middle of taking advantage of a native. Went down easily at point blank, and there's enough left to get a good look. It's a sleepwalker."

"A sleepwalker? What's a sleepwalker?" the youngest team member asked.

"You can be lucky you never met one." Sergeant Thomas Ferretti shuddered. "Sleepwalkers. Night-fighters. Spooks. They're a Vilani client race that doesn't need to sleep. Look like taken straight from cheap vampire movies, keep up for days without some fancy pills, are fanatically loyal and just don't care. They start shooting before you even arrive at the battlefield proper and keep shooting until you wake up the next day, only to find out they killed you while you slept. If you die from exhaustion, they are still shooting. I heard of a sniper the Impies left behind on Agidda, in weather so bad that most gropos never left the barracks, and when the base commander left it four days later, the bastard took him out. Apparently that guy had been there the whole time, in the middle of a monsoon, didn't sleep and just ignored the cold. These freaks even win staring contests by staying awake and not caring."

"Yeah." Another marine chipped in "A friend of mine once had a passage on a ship with one of them. Everyone slept but the graveyard shift, and he went to the locker to get a drink, as this door opens and out comes a pale fellow, freckles around the eyes, who had already been at his duty station and in the middle of his work when my buddy started duty that day, ten hours earlier, and is fit like a fiddle. Definitely spooks you…"

"Stop scaring the kids." O'Neill grinned, pointing to the pyramid. "We're dead, anyway. One shot with a weapon scaled up to this monster… or just imagine they use weapon bays like we use turrets…"

"Everyone prepare to defend the base camp. Leave the rafts and scatter. Hide the cargo. I want the minigun ready to at least score one of those fighters, even if they take out the raft before that."

**Major Littlefield's hideout**

"Oh that's just great…" releasing the safety on his rifle, he looked at the town square, where one of the warriors talked to the old man - Karsa, as he now knew - while the others watched for any dangers a meter or two away. The populace kept their distance from the alien soldiers.

Sha'ala looked at him with a questioning look, and they tried to communicate via the sand in their hideout. It didn't take him long to get the idea across. "No fight Ra!"

"We have to fight. It's too late."

She looked at him pleadingly, noticing from his voice that he had decided to do it, but he couldn't do anything about it. Sixteen hours until Luna would try to connect to them, and the gate pyramid was blocked by a behemoth of a starship. Luna would be able to fight of any invasion attempt through the gate - the vacuum would do most of the job, anyway - but if the aliens could somehow get the gate address, Sol had another war on its doorsteps.

Maybe they could radio ahead and request a nuke to take out the pyramid… thank god for the guy that had decided to place anti-ship missile racks next to the particle gun. Still, they would try to capture tech, just in case the gate survived being nuked. If that was even necessary.

Now that Kawalsky had shot one of the Anakundu, a fight would be inevitable, anyway. The least they could do now was make sure every shot hit. Maybe they could even capture one of those guys. Provided they survived.

A short consultation later, he fired his miniature rocket. Smiling, he watched it hitting directly in the middle of the cluster of armed bullies and killing most of them with its fragmentation warhead.

Surprised, the one that looked like an officer turned around, only to be hit by a burst of supersonic metal from another soldier's rifle. Falling to the ground, he yelled something unintelligible, as Karsa ran for a building.

Moments later, a horn sounded as the local guards at the walls noticed it. Slowly flying over the city, the unprotected pilot was apparently addressing the Nagadans over external speakers, firing his plasma guns in between partial sentences.

Just as he finished the first part of the announcement, a high powered salvo from Littlefield's gauss rifle hit him square in the helmet, overpowering the armor and killing him, causing the glider to instantly crash into one of the buildings.

The other fighter left over immediately headed for the cargo craft, which retracted its rings and fled for the mothership, followed by missiles and rifle fire.

"What the hell was _that_?" Rodriguez' voice came over the comm. channel.

"Kawalsky had to save a local, so we had to leave an impression. Let's hope we find enough of that thing to reverse-engineer. How's the translation going?" Littlefield answered.

"Fortunately, this is basically Ancient Egyptian pronounced differently, so I could work from my existing database. We finally gathered enough vocabulary to enhance sign language, initiating upload. Just have the locals speak into your mike."

"Understood."

Watching the painfully slow progress bar, he scrolled through the data on the mothership projected on his HUD. It was a giant, and they had no anti-ship weaponry. But they were Marines, trained in boarding actions, and they would try their luck.

A moment later, the data transfer as completed, and he took out his computer. Smiling, he spoke into the microphone. "This machine will translate. Do you understand what it says?"

As the speakers gave out the translated sentence, Sha'ala looked at him with wide eyes, and then giggled.

"I understand." Was all the translator could make out of her answer, but she said more, and apparently it was already at the "hilariously funny mistranslations only a machine could create"-stage. Then she went on. "Why fight Ra?"

"One of us killed one of them, as he tried to… have his way with one of your people. Ra will miss him, and so we decided to fight when we at least have a small chance."

She nodded. "No bad reason. Still, we all die because." After a few seconds, she raised an eyebrow, pointing at herself "That why you say no? Not want when me not want?"

"Yes." The major nodded. "But now we have to try to survive."

She smiled, bowed forward and kissed him. "Good decision. Juan good man. Unnecessary. You right, we fight. What weapon me?"

Looking at her dumbfounded, he only managed a "The hell?"

"Bad Amentet?" she looked at him questioning and he shrugged.

"That's how you say it. No, no weapon for you. You'll only hurt yourself."

"Hurt Ra's men, too. Die anyway. What weapon?"

"No, no weapon for you. You don't know how to use it, anyway."

"Fight Ra, not fight me."

**Alpha raft, Abydos**

**Two klicks from the gate pyramid**

**Half an hour later **

The men had hid most of the material under the camouflage nets covering the vehicles, and now where moving it elsewhere, while their two weapon specialists prepared both the minigun and the automatic grenade launcher for automatic deployment in case there were more of those fighters.

"We're ready!"

"Just in time, those guys are heading for the hangar."

"Run!"

The two specialists ran for their lives, trying to hide behind a dune while the minigun started to unload a full magazine of a thousand shots onto both the tel'tak and the remaining Udajeet glider. Unshielded, the unprotected udajeet pilot did not survive even a dozen bullets, with most of the rest hammering the transport's armor to no avail.

**Sarcophagus room**

**Ra's ship**

**Some time earlier**

Waking up after a lengthy sleep in the sarcophagus, Supreme System Lord Ra slowly rose from the vital device. He had made it a tradition to cross this region of space aboard his pleasure yacht this way, as local space was full of navigation hazards.

The yacht operated on an old hyperspace drive nearly a century after his Ha'tak fleet had been upgraded with vastly faster drives… which would be useless in this dangerous region of space. Local hyperspace was full of tiny bubbles moving in straight lines at slow FTL speeds. What made it even more problematic was that these bubbles were only detectable from close range and a collision was fatal, so that traveling at normal speed was a death sentence.

Most of the local worlds did not have a chappa'ai, making the region nearly worthless for the system lords. Among the worlds that did, Tau'ri was the most important one, a world he had not visited in millennia.

He had been expelled from Tau'ri by a rebellion, but he hadn't needed that world anymore when this happened. It had been a strike at his ego, not his power.

Still, this region contained worlds that had cost him dearly, even if never to the point where it got noticed.

Whole fleets had been lost trying to take a few worlds some 10,000 years ago, being shot at by defenses older than his race. Strange gates nothing like a chappa'ai shooting massive rocks nearly as fast as light or beams that simply disintegrated material like the Asgard weapons did weren't even the most dangerous ones. Some worlds had been defended by invisible beam weapons, that _ignored most of his shields_ while being fired from emitters _shielded by several kilometers of rock_. As he did not have enough resources to glass a world just to get rid of defense batteries that kept killing Ha'taks effortlessly, especially after losing several ships en route to those bubbles, he had passed on them.

Plus, there was a definite limit to how many losses he could cover up without the other Goa'uld noticing.

Ra knew the Jaffa considered this region of his domain the "death rectangle", but he did not really care about this superstition. It made the Naquadah from Abydos even more important, as getting it from here – so close to the rectangle – made a point about his power. There was a certain irony in the fact that all his Jaffa came from stock evolved on worlds in this region.

Once upon a time, there had been officer and soldier castes, but they had interbred to the point of becoming one long ago. This had weakened the abilities of the races he had created them from – working for days without having to sleep and a short, adrenaline triggered burst of strength the Goa'uld larvae soon had managed to control, respectively – but it had given the Goa'uld a better balanced army. It had also allowed him to better control the fatal genetic disorder one of the races had brought into the mix, and as a result the Jaffa population as a whole.

Ra expected his room to be empty, and silent. Instead, warning lights lighted up the pel'tak board behind the sarcophagus.

Opening a comm. channel, he growled "Situation report! What is happening?!"

"My lord, we have lost contact to the collectors in Nagada. Udajeet two is already escorting the first Tel'tak full of Naquadah ore back, it reports one was shot down by unknown magic. I already ordered a group of a hundred to take the city by foot."

Frowning, Ra went to the control board and looked at the data, as suddenly, his ship's sensors automatically zoomed to the Tel'tak coming back to his ship. The Udajeet veered of, crashing into a dune as a stream of metal left another dune only two kilometers away from the pyramid, rapidly wandering over and concentrating on the Tel'tak.

At the same time, small explosions rocked the outer hull near the pyramid. With the press of a button, one of his ships' plasma guns opened fire, glassing the area and immediately stopping the fire.

"Good, let the blasphemers die."

**Near the remains of alpha raft, Abydos**

It took all of Matthew O'Neill's self discipline to stay in place under his sand covered camouflage net near the place where just seconds ago, a bolt of plasma from the pyramid had converted their vehicles into heaps of scrap metal.

There was still a rain of fragments and no one dared to leave cover, but his sensor readings showed the guns were powered down. Now all they could hope for was having the enemy think they were dead. At least they shot down the fighter, he sighed.

**Major Littlefield's hideout**

Cursing, major Littlefield watched the icons of two air/rafts disappear from his HUD. Checking the signals of the crew's suits, he noticed that they somehow had managed to survive. Apparently, this alien packed a decent bit of firepower… But he hadn't assumed otherwise, anyway.

If they had to, they would put all their efforts into destroying the enemy ship, but he still hoped to save the technology – and the Vilanium. Which just got harder as the freighter entered the mothership.

While he did not really expect to be successful, he knew that doing nothing would doom charted space. They had to at least try it.

"Everyone to the walls, let's see if they send more gropos. Sixteen hours, guys. We have to make sure these aliens don't get the Terran address, or at least make sure it does not leave the system."

Loading another unguided missile, he ran to the city walls, going to a place where he could cover both the desert and the place the ore had been beamed from.

Behind him, Kawalsky was placing a few grenades around the teleporter platform and loading their activation codes into their TacNet. Anyone beaming in there would get a hot welcome.

As the Sergeant finished placing the last grenade, he noticed Sha'ala near him, grabbing a staff weapon, and looking quizzically at the grenades.

He took his translator and said "Tell them to keep clear, if any 'gods' come in here anyone closer than 15 meters or not behind cover is in for a world of hurtch

She made wide eyes and started yelling something, which seemed to have the effect he had wished, as people rushed to clear the place.

Smiling, he ran for the walls.

Just as he had climbed them, Sha'ala and a few of the boys - including the one the doc had been working with - appeared on other wall sections, carrying those clumsy staff weapons or stuff looking like coiled snakes. "Great, major's gonna love that…"

Sighing, he unstrapped a small device and placed the small solar cell array issued with his gun in a place where it wasn't likely to be shot and connected the two parts of equipment, dialing the weapon to high power.

Thankfully, this was a desert and it wasn't dark yet, so he could use that setting without burning through energy cells as fast as it usually did. And he could definitely use the extra range and stopping power this offered. Smiling, he noticed the HUD overlay representing effective range of his gun move forward a few hundred meters.

Just a moment later, the doc's voice entered their comm. network "Err, Major? Ska'ara and a few of the other boys just took the weapons from those aliens and climbed the walls. Sha'ala is with them, too."

"What the...?! Where exactly are they?" he definitely sounded concerned. For those untrained natives with very clumsy weapons. And not for this hot local woman. Kawalsky raised his eyebrows. He didn't believe that for a second.

And yet… there were people coming to the city, running in columns of two, to be precise. There was a single man at the front, wearing a uniform that was a lot more ornate. 'Idiots, offering us a sniper trap…'

**Jaffa column, about one kilometer from the city **

Shanau, leader of a hundred Jaffa, ran in front of his warriors, his prim'ta offering him the extra endurance needed for that run. The natives had dared to oppose their god, and it was his divine task to punish the blasphemers.

By now, Ra should have left the sarcophagus, making his task even more important, as he knew his god would be watching.

After crossing a dune that was higher than all the others in the vicinity, he heard both thunks and his warriors shouting. Looking back and using his helmet's magnification magic, he noticed four of his warriors in the middle of the column had fallen, and their brothers were hurrying around them, building a defense perimeter, pointing out with their staff weapons.

As always, symbols were appearing and blinking all over his vision, burying him in information he did not need or comprehend. Presumably both.

He immediately made his way back, to investigate what had happened… and not to be isolated from his brothers when the ambushers would inevitably come out of their hideouts.

As soon as he came into short range, the magic on his men's helmets interacted with his own and lines speared from the corpses towards the city.

Grunting, he switched into officer mode with a thought, getting the health status of all his men. They all were painted green. Green was good. That was at least useful.

**Nagada city walls **

Unbeknownst to the Jaffa, they had long been in range of the defenders' armament, the only problem being the dunes blocking line of sight and an inconvenient lack of target designators or homing ammunition.

Thus, as they reached the top of a dune, four gauss rifles were trained on their position, which was easily inside close range. Just as the middle of the column crossed the ridge, they opened fire.

Chaos erupted, and the aliens immediately started to form a defense circle.

"Oh, come on. What's _that_? Playing wagon fort?! Well, if you _want_ to make it that easy for us…" sighing, Major Littlefield released one of his unguided micromissiles, targeting straight for the middle of the circle. Moments later, a second and third followed, filling the Jaffa position with fragments moving at supersonic speeds.

A moment later, of the 96 Jaffa that had survived the rifles, only 40 were still standing, and none of them had escaped unscathed. The ornate warrior had been where the first missile hit, and there was nothing left of him.

**Gate temple**

**Abydos, half an hour later **

It had been a boring guard duty, even if the six Horus guards had been informed about a small scale revolt… that had cascaded into the loss of two Udajeets. So the men watched the entrance closely, some of them with their staffs leveled.

What they expected were a bunch of locals storming the gates, what they got… small metal spheres rolled close to them, and even as the first Horus guard managed to react and yell "GRENADE", the two fragmentation warheads exploded, shredding the unprotected parts of the guards.

They died immediately, as the damage was too much for their prim'ta to deal with.

Seconds later, two Marines stormed into the room, taking position and allowing their comrades to follow. Having donned their helmets, the darkness was no obstacle, and targeting aids were already pointed at the stairs.

Slowly, they worked towards the stairs, as suddenly, a heavy piece of stonework hit Matthew O'Neill in the head, killing him immediately.

Frantic shooting answered his death, burying lots of ammo in the walls, before a lucky hit killed the offender from a burst of supersonic armor piercing 4mm darts.

"Holy shit, what the hell was _that_?! Didn't they say spooks?"

"Apparently that one was a berserker. Or a nighter and a berserk loved each other very much…"

"The pictures! Get them out of my head NOW!"

After some chuckles, Ferretti called out. "Expect only berserkers. Plus, we will have to interview them. Stun grenades!"

Moments later, three stun grenades flew into the gate room, and the men heard the thunks of bodies falling to the ground.

Slowly, they approached the bodies, each of them lowering a gun barrel to their necks while another one applied cufftape to the jaffa's arms and legs.

After a few minutes, the first of the guards woke up, stared at the gun pointed at him and suddenly reared up, trying to get out of the tape. This only earned him a grin as the tape cut deep into his flesh.

"Come on, you're not the first berserk we captured, but if you want to try…" After struggling for another few seconds, the man collapsed, panting heavily.

Ferretti smiled, activated the translator and asked. "Okay, now that we established who's boss, how can we get into that ship of yours?"

The Jaffa laughed "Ra, powerful… magic… kill… blasphemer!"

"If necessary, we will kill this Ra, yes. But first, we have to get aboard. And YOU will tell us how. Magic? No such thing. Sounds like mushroom management."

"Rather… die."

"That can be arranged. Magic, pha! What are you, some stone age Nightfighter that's impressed by imperial trinkets?"

"More like middle age, with that armor…" another quipped "Anyway, backwards enough to buy into Clarke's laws."

"Well, we're Terrans. We don't!" Ferretti grinned. "Let me tell you boy. Ten years ago, we finished closing a 2,200 year tech gap in less than 40 years, and our scientists are bored!"

Which was true. If the invasion of Nusku failed and access to the imperial databases was denied, a whole lot of reverse-engineering specialists had to look for new job opportunities - and there was no doubt the job market for domestic industrial espionage was too small.

While Ferretti hit the Jaffa with the butt of his rifle, Corporal Buntapvekarn noticed a strange circle close to the gate, which was accompanied by what looked like a strange airlock in the ceiling only showing up on his helmet's hyperspectral visor. Marking the outer boundaries of the circle with IR glowsticks, he placed four grenades into the inner part, armed them and sent the activation codes into their TacNet.

"Sarge, I found what looks like it could be one of these teleporters. It's IR marked, and I packed in some grenades just in case."

"Good work, Corporal." Ferretti nodded. "So we have a teleporter. How does one use that thing?" With this information, he continued the… interview.

**Sarcophagus room**

**Ra's ship **

Unbelieving, Ra had watched the video feed of nearly half the troops that had been dispatched to the city disappear before they even were in ten times staff weapon range! This was unacceptable, simply unacceptable.

Just a moment later, he heard a loud bang, noticed strobing lights and heard bodies hitting the ground, followed by shouts as his remaining Horus Guards streamed towards the rings while some small metal objects ricocheted into his room.

Fighting aboard his yacht?! Within moments, the children he used as a human shield entered.

Ra donned his Kara'kesh and left his ship's command center.

**Throne room**

**Ra's ship **

Moments later, the rings activated again, transporting in a group of five invaders with strange weapons, one of them holding the severed hand of one of the guards that had watched over the gate.

While fortunately, two of them looked at the statue surrounding the rings, all of them were on their knees, wore full body armor and helmets and sported strange weapons, which immediately opened fire while the remaining two men corrected their positions to face the guards.

As some of the plasma shots hit the invaders, their armor withstood the first hit, killing the offender with the second.

Unfortunately for Ra, in the time it took his men to kill two attackers and ruin his statue, they had managed to kill about ninety percent of his men.

"**You dare enter my ship!"** the Supreme System Lord's voice boomed over the firefight, and immediately, the Guards ran to protect him, acting as another layer of his meat shield while firing at the rings.

At the same time he fired a bolt into one of the invaders, hurling him several meters back.

Unfortunately, this only led to him being promoted into a priority target and two grenades thrown his way.

With a loud bang a series of grenade shell fragments hit his basically unprotected body, cut the Goa'uld in his host's neck in half and ended an era.

For a moment, the world seemed to stand still as the corpse of a galactic dynasty's ruler fell to the ground. The Horus Guards had sworn to follow their god into death and would not dare to live any longer than it took to kill these invaders.

Blood was everywhere, the moans of dying, and yet charging, Jaffa, remains of grenades…

And the TacNet's status symbols were crystal clear. Of the six Marines that had stormed the ship, four had died, O'Neill even before reaching the rings.

Sergeant Ferretti was wounded by a staff hit at his arm, but not in critical condition. In the ornate throne room around him and Corporal Buntapvekarn, dozens of Jaffa corpses and body parts lay around.

"Sitrep!"

"Ferretti here, sir. No hostile forces left over, only Cpl. Buntapvekarn and I are still in fighting condition, TacNet reports everyone else is dead, but I only know it for sure on O'Neill. We managed to clear the first room on the ship. Bastards had three fifths of the rings covered by some kind of statue and shot two of us in the back. We killed approximately a hundred enemies, are out of grenades and I just ran out of power cells. The rafts aren't salvageable, but we can use the others' ammo and cells. Cleaning up the ship now.

We took out what looks like an officer, maybe the captain of the ship. Had some fancy hand device that hurled Singh several meters back without contact. Still was half naked and nearly decapitated by a frag grenade."

"Thanks, we're underway. Took out another hundred soldiers. Think you can clean out their hangar bay?"

"Yes, sir. Provided we find it."

"Do so. We still have fourteen hours until gate activation."

**Gate temple**

**Abydos**

**August 31, 2155**

The survivors of Terra's first gate expedition sat between the columns next to the gate and watched the artifact as it began to dial.

As soon as it began to spin, everyone grabbed their weapons, lowered their visors and targeted the gate.

Suddenly, their heavily encrypted handcomms lit up. "This is Luna gate Control, can anyone hear me?"

"Luna, this is Gate Scout. Littlefield here. Request immediate reinforcements and refugee help."

"Major?!"

"Sir, we encountered hostile aliens playing god and a city of native humans that lived as slaves. It cost us two rafts and four good men, details are in the mission upload. LT LeClerc classifies the hostiles as Anakundu-Answerin hybrid with added updates, mainly a pouch carrying some kind of snake and changed eyes. Definite non-imperial tech base, though. The only 'imperial' things we found were the soldier base races and an open pit mine for the missing Lanni hull alloy metal. This is all in the upload, as is the language file Dr. Rodriguez developed with a native, sir. I also have to report that both Dr. Rodriguez and me got unknowingly married by local customs and intend to honor it. According to my wife, we killed their god, who called himself Ra."

"You found _what?!_ Your wife? Hybrids?" General Li's voice over the intercom sounded shocked, and as the vidfeed came up, he was visibly close to losing control, while a soldier in the background held up a sign reading "congratulations" as well as his thumb.

"That was my first reaction, too, Sir. The upload includes all the footage. But first things first. We have had no chance to look for the address to get back yet, but Dr. Rodriguez reports the pedestal reacts to usage attempts like the promethean one does. Estimated local population is 100,000 baseline humans living at medieval tech level in a desert city. Request some robofacs, vapor collectors, teaching material and whatever is necessary to help the locals - their masters did forbid them to write, and we're working with an incomplete translation matrix.

Sir, we captured an alien super dreadnought mostly intact - we guess more than a million dtons volume with two hundred kilotons volume shaved of for some pyramid landing mechanism - and we found maybe two hundred tons of... Barnardium?" he looked to Rodriguez, who nodded.

For what seemed like hours, silence was their only answer.

"Okay, Major. We will send CG units and you will move both gate and dialing unit out there. Expect delivery of other goods afterwards. Get me ANY data on that ship you can get without touching anything."

"Aye, Sir."

**Karsa's house**

**Nagada, Abydos**

**September 21, 2155**

In the last couple of weeks, Nagada had changed. Every roof in the city was covered by gleaming solar cells, the gate had been moved closer and a battalion of Terran grav tanks was watching it 36 hours a day.

Outside the city, big black boxes were working around the clock to assemble strange things the locals had never seen. But the Terrans were not like Ra.

One of the warehouses now housed a giant water tank fed by machines that drained humidity from the air, and for the first time in centuries, there was enough clean water to care for everyone for weeks stored.

Sheets of strange materials kept the sand out of their houses much better than the old cloth had been able to, new tools had been given to the workers, food was being shipped through the gate and people were actually setting up schools.

At the old temple, workers and things the Terrans called "robots" were crawling all over and through Ra's ship.

In the house of Karsa, eldest of Nagada, an illustrious group of Terrans and Abydonians sat around a small holoprojector showing a map of the desert surrounding the city.

The picture had been assembled by data from several scientific satellites shot through the gate and deployed by a G-Carrier now parking next to the city wall.

"…long story short, there's not much water or anything interesting but the Naquadah mining complex close to the city. Close for a raft, that is. We're talking several days' worth of walking or riding." Lieutnant LeClerc ended her first showing of the results, now wearing her non-combat uniform with a local veil shoved back to protect her from sand when outside.

"So, it's as desolate as it looked like?" Major Littlefield asked, sitting next to his wife Sha'ala and holding a glass of fresh water. He, too, had dropped the tactical suit, helmet and other heavy equipment. No one had even donned their sunglasses.

"That's the surface, Sir. Underneath, we found something. Several cave systems."

Doc Rodriguez, dressed in relaxed civilian attire, joined in "Caves? Ska'ara mentioned a forbidden cave system just yesterday…"

"Why should caves be forbidden?"

"Juan" Karsa answered "We did not want anyone to go there, because they contain wisdom Ra should not know we posses."

"What kind of wisdom?"

"Written words we can not understand, but I recognized them on your talking board. And a big stone with other, stranger symbols."

"How far away is it?"

"An hour or two towards the primary evening sun."

"Then it will be this complex." Amanda LeClerc marked a small stretch of caves.

"Okay, but can you zoom in here?" the major pointed at a bigger cave complex.

Nodding, she complied. "This room here" she pointed at a structure "is perfectly rectangular. There's no way that's a natural structure. And it's big; you can easily place an assault cutter or two in there…"

"Do any of you know this room?" the major asked, looking around him. No one knew it. "Well, then we'll send an expedition as soon as possible. Let's see what this room was built for…"

He sighed. "But this is still only the desert. Results of the orbital survey?"

Amanda LeClerc pressed a button and the hologram changed, zooming out from the vicinity of Nagada to the picture of a planet orbited by three moons. A red dot blinked in the middle of a great desert.

"This is Abydos?"

"Yes, and as you see, there is better real estate around… My government offers to build you a new city on another place."

Karsa looked at the hologram again. This world was about a tenth smaller than Terra, covered by only 30% water and very hot. Still, the Terrans had marked a few regions that looked promising.

"This region looks good."

The major looked at his notes and nodded. Karsa had pointed at a large plain that stretched from one of the two local oceans in the south between two giant river systems coming from the northern mountain range. Behind those mountains, the desert that surrounded Nagada began. It would be very possible to build a grav train connection between the two points.

"We agree. Our explorers found some species of animal looking promising for domestication, we will teach you how to fish, build boats, speak our language, read and write, use our technology…"

"And all you want for this is the ore we collected for Ra, as well as land?"

"And access to your sky."

"The sky?"

"This is Abydos." Doc Rodriguez joined in and pointed to the hologram, and then she zoomed out, showing the local system which sported another four planets including three gas giants with prominent moon systems as well as two large asteroid belts.

"This is your primary sun." She pointed to the star closest to Abydos. „And the other spheres here are other worlds. No one can live there, and only these" she pointed to the biggest of the gas giants and the asteroid belt right 'next' to it "are of interest to us."

"Why? What is there that you're interested in?"

"Big rocks. Lots and lots of big rocks, full of useful ores, like the one you mined. Just without all the sand covering it."

„So you want the Naquadah" at the blank stares, he added "That's what the metal we mine is called. So you want it and for us to allow you to mine more of it yourself? Until you don't need us any more?"

„That is…" the major winced „a fair point. Look, Karsa, men with axes can only mine so much ore, and we need way, way more…"

"Juan, I will not give up the future of my grandchildren for a few trinkets." Juan winced again, being so harshly reminded that this was family now, and not something he could leave to the politicos or corporate sharks.

"We have been exploited long enough." Karsa added with a stern voice. "You can go and mine there. But not for free. You will also not get more than one of the rocks there." He said, pointing to the giants' moons that had been detected from Abydos by telescope "Isabella told us stories. We will not end like the people in those stories."

"You have my word that you will not, but we at least need access to one of those." Juan pointed to the gas giants "We need them so our ships can work. It's like giving a Mastadge a drink, and there's much, much more of the stuff there than on Abydos…"

He nodded. "Then your ships may drink there. You may send your people, as long as you do not send more than one for ten of us. They will accept our customs, help us to understand - not only use! - your technology and help us find a place in your Confederation. We want to sit with the elders."

"Uh, home rule is reserved for worlds with a population of a least a million pe…"

"We may not be numerous, but we have Naquadah. You need it."

"Dad…" Sha'ala joined in "Juan explained it to me. Sitting with the elders requires us to send riches, starships and warriors. We do not have ships, and our warriors are not trained like theirs, even if they speak their tongue. He proposed something else."

"I'm all ears." Karsa frowned.

"Elder Karsa, we offer the people of Abydos to get home rule in five generations or earlier, as long as you have a bigger population. Which should be easily manageable, with all the new food, our medicine and no more Ra. Until then, we will consider you an allied government that isn't part of the Confederation. We will send riches, teach you how to reach for the stars, build your own defense fleet and understand all of our technology. We will train your warriors to fight the false gods on the ground and in the sky, and the elders how to prevent what happened in those stories."

"And you will point out errors to us, Juan!" Sha'ala grinned to the Major "Unless you want to sleep on the couch, that is."

He winced. This surprise marriage wasn't something he had expected, but as he looked at his newfound wife… he could live with it. He could definitely live with it.

„Sha'ala." He answered with a completely serious voice „My people once killed millions of people with less technology than they had, simply because they were greedy. And we aren't the only ones on Terra that did something like that. We will not allow this to happen again.

We are fighting a powerful enemy far away from here, and this enemy attacked many worlds, destroyed their cultures and forced them into his own. We will not act like that. We are better." He sighed. At least Terra would try to be better. Better than Cortez, better than the Ziru Sirka.

But he could not help but notice the problem of 100,000 Abydonians and their culture would be confronted with in the face of 12 billion people on Terra and another million or two in the colonies.

Karsa only nodded and Major Littlefield changed the topic. "So, what did we find out about Ra's ship?"

"A lot, Sir." Isabella Rodriguez perked up "We have finally proved that this ship does not have jump drive and uses a computing technology similar to that in the gate pedestal. We can't identify most of the things aboard, but we managed to translate some inscriptions."

She smiled "It has things called 'shields', 'subspace communicators' and 'hyperdrive'."

Tiredly, he closed his eyes. "This sounds like sci fi, you know."

"Yes, Sir, I know. I did not believe it first, neither, but then I found this…"

The holo changed, now showing a map of the galaxy, covering vast stretches of it in a dark blue.

This got everyone's attention. "What the HELL?"

"Most interesting to us is this…" she zoomed in until a marker blinked, showing the current position of the ship. Right next to a red rectangle covering much of local space. "This rectangle covers all of the Confederation, the Ziru Sirka and a lot more. About 445 by 320 parsec, stretching over the whole height of the local arm, to be exact. And then, there's this." She pointed to a golden triangle. "This is Terra."

"FTL drives to reach the entire galaxy… shields… they know of Terra… Oh my god. If anyone properly arms this thing and jumps it to Terra, we would all be dead before even noticing it! They could easily destroy VLAND, for fuck's sake!"

His world view shattered. All of his life, he had thought the empire a vast juggernaut, but one they could win against and live in peace afterwards. He had talked about not putting the Abydonians in a reservation, but now it seemed all the space mankind knew was a reservation itself. They were just children fighting over table scraps.

He needed a break. And so he excused himself, left the meeting and stared into the suns until he had to close his eyes or become blind.

**Gate position**

**Outside of Nagada, Abydos**

**November 15, 2155**

The expedition was ready. Finally, they had managed to find Terra's address, and High Command wanted them in New York, NOW.

Sha'ala and Ska'ara, as newly – if accidentally – wedded to members of the expedition were allowed to come with them.

And so she sat there in the sealed, floating vehicle, waiting for the Chappa'ai – the Stargate – to take her to Juan's home. She had never hoped to leave Nagada, never expected a better life than becoming the wife of a miner, of one of Ra's underlings if she'd been lucky, but this…

Her people's life had changed dramatically, and she was going "off world" it was going a long way to show that Terra could hold its promises.

The gate engaged, and their communicators came alive. She did not really listen, as her bit of English was not good enough yet and she was staring at the gate, anyway.

Soon after, they drove through, and came out in a vast cave. Looking around, she noticed several vehicles different from the one they were in floating, pointing their guns to the gate, as well as what looked like lots of weapons lowered from the ceiling.

Staring at it for just a moment, she felt a hand at her arm and turned her gaze to Juan.

"Welcome to the Confederation" he smiled.

**Luna City**

**Copernicus Crater**

**November 16, 2155**

The train trip had not even taken an hour, and as the daily rhythm here was accustomed to only 24 hours, they had immediately gone to sleep in something called a "hotel room".

It was a dream.

Running hot water – even enough of it to wash with! Cooking without fire and smoke. The temperature was just right, and she was even lighter. It was a strange feeling, and weighing nothing had be just great for their first night together in (or above) a Terran bed, but now she wished Juan had opted for something other than what he called "Lunar Military Standard Gravity".

A screen on the wall had originally presented news, but she didn't understand anything of it even when she got the words, so she had selected a channel with music she had stumbled onto.

At the moment, Sha'ala was standing at the big window incorporated into the room and looked over the city.

To her, Nagada had been a city. It held more people than anyone could possibly get to know in a lifetime.

Luna City? Broad streets full of floating vehicles on several lanes and levels extended to the horizon.

Above them, a big, transparent dome dominated the sky, only nearly to be touched by several of the absolutely gigantic, if utilitarian looking buildings that built the city proper.

On their way here, she had seen enough people to get all of Nagada easily get lost in the traffic, never to be seen again.

And according to her new friends, this city wasn't really a big one. Just slightly more than three quarters of a million inhabitants, while Terra had many cities with millions in it and a population of twelve thousand million... It was truly mind-blowing.

Suddenly, she felt a touch, turned around and got a kiss from her husband. "Morning."

"Morning, Darling." He smiled. "I'd turn around again."

"Why?" she did so.

"Because it's Earthrise in… three, two, one, now."

On the other side of the window, the city, the dome, a blue-white-brown-green world began to slowly rise over the horizon. She was stunned by its beauty. All that blue, all that green, all those clouds…

She didn't even think of moving for minutes after the spectacle. This was Terra; this was all he had promised to her, maybe even more. But she still was not sure if it was good for her people, or the masses on this world that had not known of Ra before.

A/N: "Lunar Military Standard Gravity" is 0.19G, and is based on a GURPS rules artifact if anyone cares.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter three **

**Downport, Government section**

**Luna City, Copernicus Crater**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**November 16, 2155**

The air/rafts came to a stop in front of the last checkpoint before the actual shuttles. As the craft opened, the Abydos expedition entered the security screening for the high security area while the Abydonians would take another shuttle in the civilian tract.

With a kiss, Major Juan Maria Littlefield said goodbye to his newly wedded wife Sha'ala and went for the airlock to the New York Shuttle, while Dr. Isabella Rodriguez bid farewell to her husband Ska'ara.

A moment later, the sleek shuttle in Navy colors rose silently into the dark sky, leaving the two of them only to gaze at this spectacle of power. They had never seen as many people as were strolling through this area, let alone as many ships of all kinds. And the impressions… there were stores everywhere, selling things they had never imagined possible.

Colorful screens, holographic projections, strange smells and music were everywhere, with people going their ways, ignoring everyone else, towing their floating luggage behind.

An artificial voice breached her gaze and made her notice her surroundings again consciously.

"Last call for flight T-AA-85429 to Phoenix Main, repeat Passengers for T-AA-85429 to Phoenix report to Terminal 5."

Shaking her head, she donned the vidglasses they had bought at the base and immediately directions to her flight as well as a clock sprang up in her field of vision, not that she could understand much of them.

"Ma'am?"

She turned around, noticing a soldier taking their luggage. "Sir, Ma'am. If you please follow me, your shuttle is scheduled to leave soon."

Nodding, they let themselves be led to the relevant terminal, making it to their flight just in time to get good seats with a view. The flight took a bit over two hours, and while Terra had looked great from the hotel room, the complete picture was even more amazing.

Approaching from the night side, vast stretches of light covered the continents, sometimes broken by circular holes of darkness or vast stretches of irregular darkness with random specks appearing, only to disappear again when there was no sunlight to be reflected off them. Curiously, she played around with the magic glasses, trying to see more. When she found the magnifying option, those tiny specks turned out to be vast installations floating in space.

Dozens of giant cylinders pointed away from the world while even more were still under construction and a massive spherical station was the center of seemingly endless streams of ships coming and leaving on their own schedules. In some stations, the hulls of gigantic ships were constructed, while a damaged behemoth passed them on his way to a dock.

Then they passed into the day side, and there was more even to see.

The world was blue and white, covered mostly by water and what Juan had told her were clouds, with only some green and brown land, a few black specks and some circular bays. Once she had digested the idea of looking _down_ to clouds, she looked at one of these bays, and immediately a message appeared in the middle of her view.

"ALGIERS

Nuked on 06/25/2148 AD

10 million dead

NEVER FORGET"

Blinking, she closed the window and looked away at the sea as the landmass north of the crater slowly approached.

A few minutes later, their shuttle lowered itself on a landing pad out of many on Madrid's combined Air- and Spaceport, and they were led towards a terminal that looked just like the one they had left on Luna, only without the dome, with a lot more people, and Confederation recruitment videos everywhere.

Blindly following the directions on their HUDs, they soon reached a friendly old couple holding up signs with their names.

"Mr. Littlefield?" Sha'ala tried and the old man smiled.

"Shalla? Forget it, kid. I can't pronounce that. Let's visit the house and wait for the others."

After the greetings were finished, they entered a sleek air/raft which rose high into the sky and headed for the southeastern coast.

As it slowly came closer, they noticed a lot of dikes holding back the vast amounts of water and some AR markers showing the places where the ocean had eaten whole cities, like the Abydonian desert ate encampments if given enough time.

"We're going to the water?"

"Yes, our house is close to the ocean. I'm glad grandpa bought one high enough and far enough inland for us to keep it when the sea level climbed…"

**Littlefield family Finca**

**West of Cartagena, Spain, European Union, Terra**

**November 18, 2155**

It was a cozy evening at the finca's terrace, with the Littlefield and the Rodriguez families sitting around a big table, barbecue and decent music running in the background. The weather wasn't too hot, and Juan and Isabella had come back from New York this afternoon, while the Rodriguez' family had come for a visit from their home on Prometheus.

"I have to say, I'm impressed. I expected something newer from 'Littlefield's family Finca'." Isabella Rodriguez smiled. She wore a sundress, light sandals and a tablet with wine glasses.

Next to her, Juan Littlefield, wearing shorts, a Hawaiian shirt and a hat carried a crate of beer. Grinning, he answered "Sounds more like a yank with Mexican roots, hm? I get that a lot. No, my grandfather moved here in the 2050's, married and we never left."

"Or changed the name."

"No, why should we?"

"Sure." They reached the table and placed the drinks, sitting down. "Another question I asked myself since Abydos? There's a story behind that pendant, isn't there?"

"Not much of a story." Juan's father answered "He got it from his grandfather, who got it from his', who finally got it from his Grandmother. She got it from her dad when they found your Stargate."

"Your family was there when they found the gate?"

"1928 in Egypt, yes. It's hard to imagine the gate being in storage for over two centuries… Just imagine if someone had tried to dial in!"

"Gets even better, apparently Russia had another one forgotten in some Siberian base, complete with dialing unit…"

"Thank god we did not find these things pre-unification." Juan took a nip from his beer "I can just see Russia and the USA fighting about who got the most out of it for selfish national interest, fuck the rest of the world."

"And Ra would not have been as 'merciful' as the impies in the first war, if the idiots managed to poke him just right."

"Definitely." Mr. Rodriguez joined in "From what the boy told me, it would have been the third war all over, just two centuries earlier and with different targets."

"Well, then." Mr. Littlefield grinned, raising his bottle. "To the Confederation!"

"To the Confederation!"

"Thankfully it was you that opened the gate." Ska'ara smiled to his wife, enjoying the evening while wearing headphones feeding him the translation into the low goa'uld that was his mother tongue.

"Yeah, how come you found this out, anyway? It's not as if Cathy Langford – the daughter of the man that found our gate – didn't spend her whole life trying."

Isabella Rodriguez blushed, nipping at her wine. "Well, you know, it's silly…"

"Know what? If you want to work well in my team, better lose that attitude. If it's silly, and it works, it isn't silly." Juan winked to her, and she loosened up a bit.

"Well, so when I was small, I stumbled onto some book by a Dr. Jackson from the 2120 Guttenberg uploads. It was called 'The Truth About the Pyramids' and told about how they were starship landing pads and all that. It was an interesting read for a ten year old, and piqued my interest for Egyptology. I read it several times, and was convinced the guy had good points, so I started to work in the field."

"My god did we try to channel her into a 'useful' job… You know, archeology isn't exactly well paid, and whenever that theory came up, you could forget most jobs anyway." Her father joined in. "I mean, I make good money, but I had no intentions to spend it on a childish hobby of hers… Unfortunately, she already owned enough stock to only waste her own money." with a sigh, he ended.

Glaring, she continued "Well, yeah, that was a major problem, even if I didn't exactly spread it. But the important people found out, anyway. I did not want to live off my parents' money, so after my stint in the Colonial Bureau and trying to look for archaeologist jobs afterward I spent some months on various digging sites in Egypt. I didn't find anything serious, so I finally joined their Prometheus base that housed the gate and built me a niche there, while privately working on Dr. Jackson's theory. I had never seen or heard of the gate until... One day, someone in Research decided bringing 'nutjobs' in on the gate project could be helpful, or a funny idea, no idea… In any case, I managed to improve the translations of the inscriptions a bit, find out the 'strange glyphs' they were trying to decipher were star constellations… and here we are." Her face changed into a smile again. "It finally paid off, and I'll make damn sure that other 'crackpots' will get some grant money from me. You never know what they'll find."

"And for some things, it would be better if we never found them…"

"Enough of this talk." The major grinned "I'll make us some spare ribs and then we'll use the pool. Time for swimming lessons."

**Field Museum of Natural History**

**Chicago, USA, Earth**

**November 12th, 2155**

"And another day wasted… do you really think we find something interesting in all this stuff?" Agent Jack Preston pointed around all the artifacts collecting dust in the museum's basement room they were in.

"Na, just let me just finish this crate. Beer afterwards…" With a sigh, agent Clinton placed a jar in the small medical scanning unit on the table in front of him.

Bored, they looked at the screen, as the picture of a Goa'uld in stasis appeared. "What the fuck?!"

Grabbing his communicator, Clinton immediately dialed the local CIA base. "Eagle base, this is Eagle four. We have a code red in the Field Museum of Natural History. We will close the place down. I repeat, code red in the Field Museum of Natural History, closing it down now."

**ARGUS Headquarters**

**Geneva, Switzerland, Earth**

**November 30th, 2155**

Deep in the bowels of one of the best shielded buildings in the whole Confederation, the most important men of Argus, the Confederation's intelligence agency sat in a nondescript room and discussed the fate of humanity.

"And now, we come to point three: Project Heaven's Gate. Michel, how is the artifact search going?" James Cousteau, head of the agency, had been an operative in more than one domestic conflict, with only a single deployment against the Ziru Sirka.

Soon, his superiors had noticed his leadership and administration skills, getting him to Geneva and really kickstarting his career.

Michel Bellerieve, the leader of Interservice Cooperation answered. "We already found a lot, James. In the US, we found two Goa'uld in canopic Jars. Russia found a new cartouche with a gate address - apparently they found it back in 1999 and immediately classified it after noticing it consisted of pedestal symbols. It also mentions an "Eye of Tiamat".

Also, there was a sarcophagus like the one on Ra's ship in a museum in Guatemala as well as a lot of staff weapons, coiled snakes, hand devices and other unidentified artifacts all over the world. The objects have been sent to different isolated space stations, and will be dealt with only by tele-operated robots after lab 51 exploded last week."

The men around the table nodded, all being aware of the Barnardium enhanced explosion which was the true cause of the damage, not the failure in an experimental reactor power core that the press had been told about.

"Thanks. Any more news about the Goa'uld?"

"Technological findings will need more time, but we already found out Goa'uld are aquatic life forms that enter their hosts through natural or artificial openings. An infestation can easily be detected by civilian issue diagnostic beds, t-ray scanners or other low-tech systems. Considering their aquatic nature, LunSec proposed an upgraded base. Their basic idea consists of adding several cubic kilometers of water, and a dozen Doolittle Dolphins."

"Interesting. Why the dolphins?"

"To make sure the Goa'uld don't do anything… stupid."

"Like taking over a dolphin?"

"LunSec also proposed trinium armor with sonic weaponry and a blue-green LASER for them."

"Interesting, send me the proposal first. But get rid of the LASERs, we donft want them to be able to escape just by taking over a fin. How's supplying Abydos going?"

"We finally found a way to cross the gap. Adding the exploration data from the rimward side of the gap proved critical in identifying the stepping stone…" Steven Calderon, head of Interstellar Operations, non-imperial allowed himself a small smile as he answered "Of course this opens up the topic of colonization. We got requests to supply three bulk freighters captured in Nusku from our stocks, and frankly, I agree. While we could use them for spying on the empire, creating new colonies behind the gap is of higher importance. The TSA asked for our input in Ember's starport upgrade. They spoke of C-level, but I will propose an upgrade to B for improved maintenance on the fuel depot, as well as better counterintelligence abilities. Once the way is mapped, we can expect a ten week one-way trip, the mapping trip will take an additional six weeks."

**President's office **

**Schuman city, Nova Europa, Copernicus Continent**

**Prometheus, Prometheus (Alpha Centauri)**

**December 1, 2155**

"So, how is Project Heaven's Door going on?" President Max Gulotta asked his cabinet.

It was a hard time for the colony. All economic decisions had been made based on projections of ever increasing population growth from the homeworld spilling off to the most important colony - only a single jump away with vast asteroid belts full of trinium. And yet, the economic forecasts concerning the conquest of Nusku were very troubling. They were quite believable, as well - most settlers preferring a garden world with a long industrial history, vast infrastructure already prepared and in the worst case prediction appreciative natives, to Prometheus, which still had problems building up its essential industry.

But soon, this would change. With the direct connection to Luna, political power of the first two confederated nations not founded on Terran soil would grow on many meetings, and people with jump sickness could escape the hurt homeworld.

No one was thinking of putting a gate on Nusku, even if the Russian Federation had located another gate and a dialing pedestal in some Siberian warehouse once the frantic global search for gate-related technologies had begun last month.

Egypt was being checked square meter by square meter, and by now all its artifacts were under quarantine while every ancient civilization was being checked intensively for alien influence, especially of the hostile kind. For the first time, military and intelligence agencies were going through museums as if they were conquered enemy bases.

"We got the pedestal back last week after Russia handed theirs over, all gates have been equipped with Trinium irises and proper dialing protocols have been established. Asteroidenbergwerke AG and Novotny Factoring already placed orders for Hill and Masterson's first Europa-class grav trains, of which the company expects delivery in early 2158. Exports to anywhere but Abydos have risen slower than expected as Behmer AG buys everything it can get to build both Strider city on Galileo continent and New Nagada. If immigration rates keep up, we will be able to qualify for the imperial 'rich world' equivalent by 2160 at the very latest." He could not help but smile at this.

Being classified "rich world" meant money. You did not need to have a lot of money to qualify, but you did need basic infrastructure, a stable government, untainted, breathable air, enough water and virgin nature. There was nothing better to get tourists than this, and with the gate connection directly to airless Luna and nuked Terra, this classification would boost their economy, their growth even further, making them a power to reckon with and allowing them to reduce their dependence on imports. So they made sure every new settlement was planned at scenic vistas or places that attracted visitors for other things.

Gulotta smiled. This was all inside his projected term, and if he could manage to claim the booms, the rule of the councilist party would be broken, possibly forever. And his place in the history books would be secured.

"So we have only those irises? What happens when someone dials in from one of the thousands of addresses found on Abydos?" President Gulotta expressed the fears of many Terrans.

Minister of defense Travis Churchill answered. "We inserted a concrete column as a basic placeholder offline mode."

"Placeholder? When can we expect a proper offline mode, and how does it work?"

"The gate in Egypt was covered by stone and sand, so the scientists think that a physical object blocking the gate should be enough to keep it offline. As such, the proper standard mode, called 'offline' consists of the gate moved into a position between two walls where a solid block of rock will be physically inserted into its opening. I expect the proper offline system to be ready for use within 48 hours."

As his listeners nodded, he activated a hologram.

"The current Starport Authority plan calls for the gate to be placed on the new highport to be constructed at Prometheus-Centauri A L2 point between the belt and us. Construction has already started, until it is competed, we have placed the gate on an old mining station. However this is only the second layer of defense. These are the plans for the station that the Starport Authority intends to build at every gate installation.

The port consists of four basic structures: Gate installation, dialing system ship, train station and the port itself. The dialing systems are on a separate ship that can detach immediately and render the gate inoperable from this site at moment's notice. The gate installation itself is able to self-destruct with the enemies trapped in there as a last resort should the need ever arise, but long before that, we can detach it and have it accelerate away. The actual gate is mounted on CG units, being able to be jettisoned or rotate into several positions: Military operation, civilian operation, defense pattern and offline."

"I already described the offline mode. 'Civilian ops' rotates the gate so that a train leaving it will hit the train station highport. We will get an upgrade to a complete class A highport installation with attached naval base and our yards upgraded to starship grade. Whenever the need to receive foreign dignitaries arises, we will be more than prepared for it.

'Military ops' works a bit like the current Sol facility; I already ordered the construction of a joint base.

Lastly, it can be rotated into 'defense mode' at moment's notice. Any potential invader will enter maximum artificial gravity vacuum and face a heavy particle accelerator bay accompanied by anti-ship missile racks, turret LASERs and railguns. This is all deployed in case they managed to overwhelm the iris, and while dialing system and gate modules are accelerating away from the port and each other. We will also have a fighter wing on standby, and offline mode will only left once we got a comm. request to open it for a precise launch window. Until we have reliable FTL comms on every base, leaving offline mode will be precisely timed four weeks in advance."

"So, what happens when an explorer team has to dial back outside of such a window?"

"The Colonial Bureau is already looking for a place to put the second Terran gate, ideally a known world, but all of them are either already inhabited or to close to Sol… Except for Sirius, but placing a gate there is the same as placing it on Agidda. Until we have either the alien drive system copied or uplifted Abydos into a proper shipbuilding world to jump it to an empty world outside imperial influence, there's no way for real OpSec. Most probably, the base will simply be put into a random system's Oort Cloud rock."

**Littlefield Living quarters, Sol gate facility**

**Mare Moscoviense, about 3,700 kilometers from Luna City**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**December 1, 2155**

"Kaufmann Sternenschiffbau AG today announced the specifications of the new Europa class gate grav train. It will be 10 kilometers long, rated at 20,000 dTons, the volume of an imperial bulk freighter, and able to reach 1,100 kph while transporting a quarter million tons and more than 1,000 passengers per trip. The Ministry of War allowed one trip per week to Abydos and back, double that to Prometheus. The class is designed to work in trains of up to ten interconnected units, operating from the new lunar train station being constructed at Mare Vaporum. Terran Starport Authority spokesman Julius Newcombe said…"

The door opened and Sha'ala came in, dressed in a wild mix of civilian female clothes from all over the known worlds and carrying a basket full of laundry. Having grown up under veils, a harsh sun and a strict father, she had immediately opted for skirts, blouses with cleavages and other clothes her family would have found shockingly "revealing". He wasn't complaining, that was sure.

As he was now completely relocated to the Sol gate facility, the two of them had been assigned married quarters. The fast growing base had been constructed from luxury staterooms and to battleship standards with armored bulkheads everywhere and located deep under the lunar soil, but fortunately, space was no problem.

This resulted in a three bedroom flat decorated with artificial wood, carpets and Juan's oil paintings to hide the metal walls, an internal entertainment network that was connected to the Terran global datanet via Luna city's garrison but physically separated from any important system and providing a fast connection to the families dirtside.

He knew that to Sha'ala, the media weren't the important things; next to actual education, it was about water, domestic appliances and other things to make her life easier. She had immediately taken to housework as she considered it her responsibility, and would only ridicule people that considered it less important than a "real job".

While doing this, she went to Abydos for two weeks each month to help her people to adapt and shape the policy of the new Abydonian Commonwealth, working on her influence as the daughter of the most respected elder Karsa, and her marriage to the man who had freed the Abydonian people. For that time, she had asked one of her friends to help him. His protests had only led to him giving that young woman a proper job as their housekeeper, but actually helping in the household was out of the question.

So now, he was the husband to a beauty of a very active politician that fought fiercely for her home, but would not let him do any housework. Yet another thing he could live with.

Dr. Rodriguez initially had more problems with her part of this culture clash, as her husband had initially expected her to "do her job", until he heard about the housekeeper, which he gladly accepted while looking for work at the base.

Besides, it wasn't exactly hard to find young Abydonians willing to work on the base for the possibility to send food and other items to their family and have a place to live where sand was no concern. Even if you weren't a bachelor looking for a housekeeper.

There would be another house in the Terran part of New Nagada for his new family, and they still could use the finca. While he wasn't as lucky as Ferretti and Buntapvekarn, who both had gotten a promotion, medals and monthly payments of several thousand Solars extra, his life had improved a lot, too.

He muted the vidscreen and set up the ironing board.

"That would have taken me a whole day at home." she smiled. "Keep gloating about your movies, guns and starships, but to me, this is progress." She still used a translator, but her English got better every day.

He grinned. "I ordered us food. Spicy Thai stuff."

"Sounds interesting. I like spicy." She smiled.

"Yes. And you shouldn't dismiss starships this early, honey. I hear they're already building a new class of ship to be based at Abydos and mount long range expeditions from there."

"I thought you can't get there from here by ship?"

"Well, it's complicated. With our own drives, you need at least a moon in between, and some politicians claimed we spent too long looking for rogue planets in the gap with no results and that the money was better spend on another warship giving a more immediate reward so until we found you there wasn't any money to look for a route. Fortunately the astronomers kept the telescopes running so when they got new data from Abydos, and money to study it, it was just a matter of number crunching to find a suitable planet."

"Why not just use the gate? Can't you move stuff through in parts?"

"Not a shipyard. Eventually, Abydos will become the center of a group of Terran colonies, and because of the gate, it will get a class A Starport. Navy Base, Starship Yard, everything you can imagine. And you lack the industrial base to build all this stuff, or even to construct a single industrial robofac. This has to change as soon as possible."

"Starport, robofacs,… I wasn't even able to conceive of these things." She smiled, then changing the topic. "I invited Isabella and Ska'ara for tomorrow if that's okay?"

Inwardly, he groaned. But at least they would have this evening for themselves. "Make it 2100. I have to brief the commanders of the new units."

As gate operations targeted at non-Terran worlds were going to be taken up someday, they already started to build a new Joint Gate Command. So the base expected a troop transport from the Terran Planetary Defense Army, units taken from developing countries that never expected orders to move offworld, and while not rained as harshly as Field Army or Marine units, were used to defense, police and constabulary duties.

The 300th tank battalion "King Leonidas" under command of Lt. Col. Bulfati from Pakistan and a Marine Line Battalion under Command of Lt. Col. Aw Hirsi from Somalia would be assigned to the base, as well as a fighter wing under direct command of his commanding officer, Lt. Col. Raffarin.

Thankfully, his own battalion had already created training facilities and high-G zones to keep their skills sharp. While Lunar Military Standard Gravity was great, every self respecting Marine spent even parts of his training regimen at LMSG, Nusku Gravity, Terran Gravity, 2G and 3G or other values to make sure he could operate in every condition from free fall to 1G and in the middle of an imperial grav ping pong attack.

And they would expect the GROPOs to do the same training. Everyone knew the Vilani fought by the book, while the 'soldiers' they had met on Abydos weren't even able to read.

Still, the troopers were already speculating what competently used tech like the one found there could accomplish. And this was what they based their training on.

No one could field whole armies that stupid, after all.

But now, it was time to look after the food.

**Kaufmann Sternenschiffbau R&D Offices**

**L5 Habitat, Terra-Luna space**

**December 30, 2155**

"So, Mr. Nailatikau, what can you tell me about the alien ship?" Heribert Kauffmann, leader of the Confederation's biggest starship manufacturer asked his chief Engineer who had just returned from Abydos the day before.

"First thing, I think we have identified the drive system. Fortunately, the contact team's translator matrix was a big help understanding the navigational data. Apparently, the Abydonians speak some sort of 'low Goa'uld', a dialect reserved for servants and slaves. With this, we managed to find out how different this drive system is. First things first, it is relatively slow."

"How slow?"

"This ship is able to pull a constant 320c, as compared to the up to 340c a jump-2 represents."

Kauffmann frowned "Okay, but that's still faster than jump-1. Has it got any other advantages?"

"Yes, it has. A lot of them. First, they do not need extra fuel. While the drive itself might actually be bigger than an equivalent jump drive, we can expect to free up at least 8 of the 10 percent of ship volume assigned to jump fuel. All this drive system needs is energy, and I'll come back to that later.

"Second, this drive has no range limitations. It just opened up the whole galaxy, or at least the rim, to us.

"Third, it also has no time limitations. Where standard jump drives trap a ship in hyperspace for about a week each single jump, you can disengage this drive system after only a few seconds and expect to survive it. FTL exploration and colonization of the Sol system just became feasible.

"Fourth, you can directly enter orbit with this hyperdrive, as it seems to be completely insensitive to gravity wells, allowing us to cut travel times for bigger stars.

"Last but not least, we found an FTL drive mounted on a 15 dTon small craft. Hyperdrive will change our side of the galaxy, and whoever sells it will be a power to reckon with. But this is only one of the big game changers, and the database spoke of this ship being a slow, royal yacht. The battleships under Ra's command are vastly faster; we extrapolated 32,000c from troop movements in the logs."

"Thirty-two…"

"That's about 5 hours twenty minutes to Nusku."

"Instead of three weeks plus in system transit,… oh my god."

Silence ruled for a moment, before the Fijian engineer went on.

"But it gets better. We also found proof of real time communications between what we would consider different sectors. With this, we could unite the planetary datanets of every world inside two parsecs without noticeable lags, and hold real time holoconferences with ships in deep in imperial territory... even while they are in transit, as long as they use hyperdrive.

"The third big game changer is their sensor technology. Those are FTL sensors able to scan a jump-5 radius without noticeable lag and detect ships in hyperspace, or anything from hyperspace even farther out. Building a new fleet with those three technologies alone would guarantee our victory over the empire, and we have not even touched the things important once we reached the battlefield yet."

"I see. But all of this is long term. Is there anything we can actually profit from now?"

"Three things. Ignoring the Naquadah…"

"Naquadah?"

"Sorry, sir. This is the Goa'uld name for Barnardium we need for the hull alloy, we also will be able to eventually reverse-engineer Ra's naquadah-boosted reactors. Short-term, we expect Naquadah-Fusion boosters to offer another 150% power output without cutting expected operation time. This would allow us to operate on a 5:2 drive to power plant ratio instead of using the standard 1:1. Where standard rule of thumb is a single engineer for ten drives and power plant modules each, we can now change this to fourteen drive and six power plant modules, and get an extra 20MW from it. Alternatively, we can use it to extend the components' lifetime and cut down maintenance needs even further." He took a sip of water "This can easily be used to provide the hyperdrive with all the energy maneuver drives normally use and improve acceleration profiles considerably, and the second short term technology will help with this. Even more use in the short term could be their bay-sized plasma guns, which should allow us to improve our designs. Additionally, their inertial dampers seem to be rated for every acceleration possible, at least there wasn't a limit mentioned anywhere. But seeing how even their technicians only talked of 'magic' in their logs… We did find numerous references in the ship's databanks to them operating up to 30g with no failures, though."

"We already looked into it, and while we are not quite as optimistic in the short term, we easily expect them to double or triple safe acceleration with only small changes."

"Excellent. The Ministry of War has extended the bidding period for the new fighter to May 2158. Will this come in time?"

"We can expect to have a Naq/Trin-hulled fighter with improved dampers and naq-boosted power ready for it, yes. I think this should be possible."

"Can we take anything else from the captured fighters? How about the avionics?"

"The avionics are the only remaining useful part. Those crystal computers are a hundred times faster than normal vehicle sized components, and are hardened for free. Their eyepiece HUD is a nifty idea, too. A standard office cryscomp would provide the performance of the computers currently installed on our flagship, only with a hundred times the storage capacity. Once we have the production up and running, it will even be cheaper than standard computers…

"The rest of the fighters? With all respect, those fighters are pieces of shit. The contact team managed to take them out by killing the unprotected pilots with an infantry support minigun, and standard issue infantry rifles – these things don't even have canopies, and all that protected the pilots from the wind were their armor and the dampers, in vacuum, they would have died immediately. It can only fire directly forward, even a spinal starship gun has better firing arcs, and it is nigh impossible to hit another fighter with two guns at once, even assuming it closes down to their pathetic range. Those things are designed to invoke fear in medieval peasants, not to meet a modern fighter and survive. We can take underlying technologies and incorporate them into standing design paradigms, maybe build an extravagant speeder model from them, but that's all there is to it."

Nodding, Kaufmann accepted this. "Well, there's only one thing left I want you to look into. See if you can improve our ability to deploy fighters through the gate. There's no better way to get fire support for scout teams or reinforcements for besieged planets, and a Roc just isn't optimized for that."

"We'll look into this, sir." His chief engineer nodded, and they concluded the meeting.

**Bridge, TCS Alexander the Great**

**Nusku High Orbit**

**February 15th, 2156**

"Target destroyed, Sir. Sector N-8 is now free of orbital defenses. Bombard-BatRon 4 ETA 3 minutes."

"Then let's move into…" Admiral Akisa Mandela looked at his holoscreen and blinked the tiredness away. Nusku's northern hemisphere was free of any defenses, the imperial fleet long ago reduced to a gigantic field of debris, drifting crippled ships and expanding gases. A last bit of the particle accelerator gun the Alexander had attacked disappeared as one of her companion ships destroyed it before it hit a city.

Only a few missile batteries on the subcontinent to the east still offered resistance, and the bombardment battleship squadron would take care of them.

At the same time, another crippled wreck changed from "contested" to "friendly" as an assault team secured it while the fourth Bombardment Battleship Squadron closed in. And in the outer zones of the system, the icons of the assault group carrying several dozen Marine Line Battalions started to move to the world, while the 1st though 3rd Army Corps began to relocate to a world two orbits farther out from Nusku.

"Relocate to S-7. BatRons 1 through 3 and escorts are to assume position at the standard jump arrival zones. Send the messengers to Terra."

Leaning back, he closed his eyes. They had done it. The first successful attack on an important imperial world. And it had happened under his command. He looked into a mirror, then frowned.

Nodding to his XO, Vice Admiral Helena Adawi he left his chair "I will prepare for the Speech, you have command."

**Enleshkaadshar Mansion**

**Southern Continent, Nusku**

**February 15th, 2156**

Eneri Enleshkaadshar, chief shugilii or main "priest" of the ancient Enleshkaadshar clan that played an important role in Sharurshid, the megacorp ruling the trailing Ziru Sirka, looked up into the sky.

The broken remains of a missile satellite rained into the atmosphere, and he could see them burn up, as suddenly, the parts started to explode in quick succession before a squadron of Terran corvettes raced by, marked as those by projections onto his smart glass window serving as a screen augmenting the things seen through it with information taken from the planetary datanet.

Looking at the tracks, he could see the parts had been tumbling in the general direction of the city of Shurikhasar, which was absolutely defenseless if you ignored the divisions of the Gisadia Ziru Sirka, which couldn't do much against starships, anyway.

Eneri put aside the mapcomp, searching for his datanet access terminal and started to browse through the news. What he found was interesting. All over Nusku, the so-called barbarians fought hard to prevent civilian casualties, destroying every piece of debris dangerous to the world and not firing a single nuke.

Sure, they obviously wanted the infrastructure intact, but imperial doctrine would have demanded to at least nuke _some_ cities and installations to show you were serious. But the only debris that had been allowed to pass was tumbling towards Gisadia bases in the middle of nowhere, while… the sky lit up, followed by a sudden CRACK, then another, and another… When he ran to the window, particle beams and plasma rained onto the Gisadia base.

Fires where everywhere, and then… the bombardment stopped.

Eerie silence followed, and moments later, fighter squadrons descended into the atmosphere, followed by dozens of obvious troop transports that opened their doors kilometers up in the air beforec infantry jumped out?! This simply had to be a malfunction. Not an unexpected one, as the net connection had already broken down once today as a repeater building had been shot.

Suddenly the speakers in his room activated itself, and as Eneri turned around, a distinguished young man – perhaps in his early 40s or Terran 50s – who radiated confidence, and wore his Navy uniform which was very plain by Vilani standards very well, appeared on his holoplayer.

"Citizens of the Ziru Sirka, Citizens of Nusku. I am Admiral Akisa Mandela of the Second Nusku Liberation Fleet. As of this moment, the skies of Nusku belong to Terra and my troops are landing to conquer your cities.

You call us barbarians, but have no fear. Those who do not attack us will not be harmed in any way, and if a Terran soldier violates these orders, I take it onto my honor to make sure he will be dealt with appropriately.

"Citizens of Nusku, we have no quarrel with you. Leave your soldiers to fight, and we will not harm you. But if you build them ammunition or help them in any other way that is not purely medical, you will be considered combatants, and as such, legitimate targets.

Soldiers of the Ziru Sirka, we do not care for you personally. If you are willing to surrender, we are willing to accept this. As of now, we are transmitting the proper surrender codes. However, rest assured that a faked surrender will not be taken lightly."

Frowning, Eneri looked at his research data. These Terrans looked promising; they actually cared for the civilians.

It spoke volumes about his rank that the Vilani considered the position in the megacorp that granted the power to inherit the family's titles unimportant enough that it was relegated to the third born children. As this required a family size not necessarily found in a high tech society, even one with a life expectancy of more than 150 years, there were always titles to be earned from families that had only one or two children so this did not lead to social unrest. Which would be against tradition, anyway.

The second eldest earned his titles by ruling the family branch in every day matters while pursuing his normal career. As the eldest of the senior branch of the clan, Eneri had earned the responsibility of life and death.

In the ancient days on Vland, where local food was simply indigestible until the correct rites had been performed, the shugilii had made sure the tribe survived.

As Vilani civilization developed, the shugilii developed into a caste of priests, keepers of tradition… and basic everyday needs. They controlled Sharurshid, the corporation ruling the trailing empire, founded on food production.

From there on, Sharurshid had branched into every basic technology – energy production, development of new colonies, ownership of every unarmed ship in the empire, even the production and distribution of goods.

Where a shugilii in ancient days had had the power to starve a tribe, Sharurshid had the power to starve worlds.

And now, perhaps, it was time to use it. He took his communicator and sent several messages before he started to look into the best way to sell his idea to the clan.

Nusku was a Kimashargur world, a world which had been settled by a group of dissidents that had become a powerful factor in the rim more than a millennium ago, only to be conquered and brought to heel two centuries later. No one had forgotten this, and there was no love for mainstream Vilani culture in the rim. They had no love for the Terrans, but a lot of hate for the Ziru Sirka.

As his clan's most important keeper of traditions, he decided which traditions to keep… and which to place on the trash heap of history.

**Terran Confederation Advisory Board**

**Terran Confederation Headquarters, New York, USA, Terra**

**May 20th, 2156**

"This concludes the Nusku report, we finally made landfall on an imperial world, and the first imperial attempts at reinforcement and reestablishing a bridgehead were crushed. What is actually more important is the guerrilla warfare of the civilians against the imperial troops, threatening their logistics. Sharurshid seems to have understood it, at least they didn't send in their scheduled bulk freighters two days after the reinforcements…" Stepan Svoboda, the European Conservative representative to the Advisory board put his notes aside, pondering the arrogance of this move again.

"My office is already preparing a home rule bill, and I propose to start diplomatic talks with the Empire immediately after Nusku is secured while preparing to attack Apishal. It's not as if this minor outpost could defend itself."

"China agrees." Deng Zemin, the senior Chinese representative answered. "We need time to consolidate our gains, travel towards trailing and incorporate the imperial technology."

"And if the Ziru Sirka does not fold?" the Eritrean representative Yordanos Senai asked.

"In that case, we conquer Apishal, which also grants us Altair. As soon as that is done, Admiral Mandela's fleet will be only three jumps away from Dingir, threatening Zaggisi - a defenseless world of a hundred million at late 20th century tech level, and the last place two jumps away from Dingir system, which is a Kimashargur world itself. Shulgi and Kinnunir, at 11,000 and 15,000 people and the same technological stage respectively, are nothing more than speed bumps for the Navy, and once we're there we could jump to Dingir at will. With the only remaining fleet in coreward Dingir Subsector being the one guarding his Capital, the governor isn't in a position to fight us without asking for help from the core. Which he will not do just because we conquered a single world.

"But this won't happen, as long as we make the armistice agreeable. Apishal is a worthless rock and even Zaggisi isn't half as valuable as Nusku. No, there's better real estate in the rim, and we should take the time to digest Nusku before we conquer those. But if we have to, we will do it." Svoboda looked around in the room, and saw his colleagues agreeing with him.

"Let us vote now…"

**Bridge, TCS Zheng He**

**Unnamed system, orbit around the central star 45° off the plane of the ecliptic**

**November 10th, 2156**

It had become boring. Once they had passed Prometheus and Ember they'd left behind the tankers and construction ships that had accompanied them to the rogue planet called Ra's Demise to begin building the giant depot that was planned there. Since then they had stopped at every system just long enough to refuel, do a thorough scan of every system nearby, superficially scan the habitable worlds and jump to the next system.

One of the first satellites sent to Abydos had been a planet hunter looking back to the Confederation while all data gathered by telescopes looking towards Abydos in the last decades was fed into the computers replacing the dialing pedestal on Luna during times it was not needed for gate operations, taking into account the fresh data from Abydos.

After only a month of number crunching, Ra's demise had been found – a 1,400 Km diameter lump of ice literally in the middle of the gap ideally suited for fuel extraction. Its detection sent shockwaves through the government, as all members that had voted to stop the search now had to fight opposition gladly using this convenient fact of "treason" or at least irresponsible impatience that endangered all Terrans.

They originally had traveled along a three world main, placing beacons with the data needed to refuel and navigate farther without having to do the same in each system, and just entered a new four world main they expected to leave in five days.

Dr. Stevenson's lab, a part of the survey module packed into a small cargo hold, was assigned to scanning the potentially habitable planets, and the one he was looking at now was only moderately interesting… Especially as this data was not relevant for the ships that were to follow once the depot at Demise was ready, so he could wait until he could have a look at the… what was that? An artificial energy signature in some random ocean on a seemingly uninhabited world?

So he immediately opened a comm. channel to the bridge. "Stevenson, Planet Lab to bridge, can we get any closer to the third planet?"

"This is Captain Ngonga, why should we?"

"I found an artificial energy signature at the bottom of a shallow ocean."

"Does it look like planetary defenses? Any danger to following convoys?"

"Wha…?"

"Dr. Stevenson. We have orders to supply Abydos ASAP, and I won't call the Andromeda for a mere scientific curiosity. Unless it's a potential risk to convoys just mark it as high priority discovery and report immediately once we're there, but these freighters have to arrive at Abydos next month or the colonization to trailing will be delayed and we can't afford that."

**Bridge, Sleipnir**

**Milky Way Hyperspace, galactic rim**

**November 10th, 2156**

It was an interesting time for the Asgard. Millennia of War had cost them much, but now the tide was turning. In the last decades after the big breakthrough in weapon technology, enough Valkyries had left the yards to secure a quarter of Ida from the replicators, and the remaining territories would follow suit soon.

No one had been in this sector in millennia, with other regions more important for the big bluff, and so the scout Sleipnir did not know what to expect when its sensors detected a slow hyperspace obstacle.

Immediately, ancient security systems went into action, catapulting the Sleipnir back into normal space, klaxons blaring and shields coming up. Just another microsecond at this speed, and the ship would have become a short-lived artificial sun…

"Computer! What the hell was that?!"

"Scanners detected a spatial anomaly on an inevitable collision course. Threat response classified the probability of the Sleipnir being destroyed at impact at one hundred percent, regardless of shield strength. Therefore, emergency braking protocols were initiated." The clearly artificial voice answered.

There was not much arguing with that, Penegal agreed. "Show me all we have on this… event."

A hologram appeared, showing the data. "It is a small bubble of normal space in hyperspace, stabilized by venting hydrogen in special patterns. It moves in a straight line at about 340 times the speed of light."

"Interesting. How efficient is this?"

"It is very inefficient. At this rate of hydrogen expenditure and the estimated volume of the moving object, the vessel can not hope to stay in hyperspace for longer than a few weeks."

"Very interesting, let us have a look at this, set new course parallel to the object at the same speed, and start a thorough scan for more of those."

**A/N: **Here's a [url= /?x=26.414&y=-105&scale=64&options=887&style=poster]map[/url] of The region Abydos is in, with the Terran Confederation to the left. Abydos is located on the world called Jorjor on the map, and Heliopolis is Epirus.

A map more or less contemporary to the story (2170 without the Crossover…) can be found [url= .de/originals/pictures/030911120951_ ]here[/url].

Up is coreward, down is rimward, left is spinward, right is trailing.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter four**

**Passenger cabin 5**

**Sharurshid Standard Branch freighter #Nusku 2356-1278**

**En route to Nusku's 100D limit**

**August 1, 2156**

Eneri Enleshkaadshar sat in his cabin and smiled. The screen showed Nusku's sky filled with Terran ships, new defense satellites being built and shipyards brought back online.

While the Terrans had picked Nusku for valid reasons on their own - being the world closest to the border and sporting major naval yards - they had also found the perfect world to invade for completely different reasons. The world had been a host of suppressed hate against mainstream Vilani culture ever since it had been conquered during the time of the Terran crusades, and all it needed to explode and try to shake of the yoke was an opportunity.

So the day orbital supremacy had fallen to the Terrans was the day Nusku rose.

Sometimes, civilians even helped the conquerors destroy armed units, but most combat was at insurgency level… and Eneri had convinced his brothers. As the head of the energy department, southern continent, western region, Ganidiirsi had controlled 200,000 employees while Mazun cared for the clan's mercantile interests that now included helping the rebellion. Although Eneri had made sure his clan's influence had cost the defenders dearly, he knew he had never been part of the rebel's highest echelons. All he did was insure the armed forces in their area got starved of reactor spare parts, meanwhile other officials gave away positions of fuel depots, ammo storage and other essential bits of information, or even participated in actual attacks.

So, Eneri never was more than a voice in the background and an advisor to the clan and his caste, promoting the traditions of the Kirmashargur, while his brothers acted more directly.

His families' line was unbroken to the first colonization, and so his brothers possessed powerful voices when it became time to rise in the open. While this had not been unimportant, the main fights and rebellions had been on the northwestern continent, were the planetary capital was located and the oldest unbroken had fiercely fought for independence the second time in a thousand years. Only this time, they won.

The rebels had hoped for more rights, not being controlled by the army, but what they got… Nusku was in the middle of an economic boom. This alone was unprecedented, as the whole empire was built to prevent sudden changes, slow them down and make sure everyone knew the results beforehand.

While the empire had used the last two millennia to refine its tech base and perfect every application of it, going so far as to give every worker an expert system that gave out perfect step-by-step guides to everything, the Confederation, which had closed this gap in less than half a Terran century, valued personal freedom over everything and just allowed the economy to grow.

There was a new ruling class of Terrans, but they tried to respect the local traditions that did not clash head on with their own, and the locals were more than happy to throw many of those traditions in the trash bin of history.

People were learning English, and he had immediately started to invest money in confederated corporations. Now his ship… _His_ ship! Even he, the main shugilii of a respected family of enshii, an old and noble clan, a member of the Unbroken, had not had the right to own his own ship.

True, the Enleshkaadshar had never been a particularly important unbroken clan. But still, having every single ship under government control was never something he considered a particularly good idea.

Now anyone that managed to convince the bank he could make money with it could buy one. He was not entirely sure if _that_ was a good idea, or just the opposite extreme, having seen some Terran ships run down to the point that he'd have given his brother a stern talking to if he had allowed someone in his department to let one of his ships to become a disgrace like that at the port. Still, there would be a stream of settlers, scientists, merchants, engineers and tourists between Terra and Nusku, bringing smaller booms to the worlds of Aggida and Barnard in between, and maybe create a better understanding between the Vilani and Terran people.

Maybe some day, there could even be peace. And so he went to see Terra, the "barbarian" world that had shattered the mighty defenders of the Ziru Sirka. Fortunately, he hadn't been in the most important circles of the resistance, so he was free to go wherever he wanted.

His intercom chirped. "Shugilii Enleshkaadshar, you wanted to be informed ten minutes pre-jump."

"Yes, thank you, captain." Closing the channel, he took his cane as he rose, still having difficulty with the Terran Standard Gravity he had chosen for his quarters. This was more than two thirds more weight than he was used to, after all.

He was dressed in a dark green robe, prescribed from the days of old, when courageous Vilani had built the empire. He was a Kimashargur, considered a radical by mainstream Vilani culture. He had fought his compatriots and collaborated with the enemy. Mainstream Vilani in the know spit out his name in barely suppressed hate, Kimashargur Vilani spoke it with more respect than his former post demanded. He had sold his estates, only kept the main mansion, made sure his now superfluous servants found new masters he trusted, as their families had served his own for centuries. He was leaving for a barbarian world, after having made sure his brother's sons were firmly founded in the traditions while being able to adapt to new ideas. They had been good apprentices, and it was easy to assign them to these posts, as he had simply treated it like a trip to Vland - a trip taking nearly two and a half Terran years per direction, and therefore dealt with much like a death, just without any real inheritances.

And yet, ten minutes before a jump, he started to sing the old prayers, began the rite of the jump, for he was not nearly radical enough to give up all his traditions.

**Isolation lab, space station Beta 47**

**Earth-Luna L4 point**

**August 10, 2156**

The sarcophagus opened as Hathor slowly regained consciousness, reaching out and slowly rising from her long sleep.

Confused, she looked around.

Metal walls formed a small room, with only a mechanical arm and some hovering drones sharing it with her.

In a deep Goa'uld voice, Hathor commanded to know "What is this? Where are we? Where is Ra?"

There was short silence before a disembodied voice answered in bad low Goa'uld. "You be a prisoner of the Terran Confederation. Ra is dead. Killed we. Am I read right you be Hathor?"

"We are the mother of the pharaohs. We demand to speak to your god."

Silence for a moment, the barbarian had trouble translating it, it seemed. "He is… indisposed." Amused. This slave was clearly amused!

Raising her kara'kesh, Hathor shot at the loudspeakers the closest to her in a fit of rage. "Bow before your goddess!"

"No one bow before Goa'uld. Don't fear, nice brig…"

Suddenly, massive beasts were sitting on her shoulders, forcing her on the floor.

"You will obey."

A door opened as the weight on her shoulders ceased. Now she could influence… most of her hope diminished when she saw the men coming in to pick her up.

They wore full body armor with helmets, and guns that looked nothing like the weapons of terror Jaffa used. One of them even wore a baton with a switch, reminding her of a painstick.

Still, she used her pheromone nish'ta, if weakened so it wasn't visible, to get the soldiers under her spell. But they didn't even seem to register it, and one of them spoke, his voice clearly influenced by the armor "Hand over device."

With that, he pointed at her Kara'kesh.

"Never!" The beasts were back and lightning wandered over the soldier's baton. "Hand over."

"No!" her voice lost a bit of the strength as she realized these people controlled gravity inside the complex, yet did not use anything that even reminded her of technology allowed to be used by Jaffa. How long had she been asleep, and where had she been brought? She only needed a bit of regeneration during the last unrest in the slave kennels. While she mulled over this, the second soldier grabbed her, picking her up easily and pointing his gun at her. Then the man with the baton forced her arms behind her back, taking of the kara'kesh and binding her hands with some kind of tape. "Obey."

As she followed them outside, hands bloody from her struggle with the tape, Hathor found herself in an unadorned metal corridor leading from her isolation cell and having a saner gravity level. Moments later they passed what looked like a window, and she could only stare in shock at the star field filling it. But this wasn't even the worst. The worst thing was the sight of two wedge-shaped spaceships roughly the size of an Al'Kesh docked on a nearby orbital installation bristling with weapons, all adorned by the same symbol her captors wore on their armor.

"Follow or be died."

**Bahlon Habitat,**

**Bahlon system, Pel'tak**

**August 10, 2156**

Bahlon Habitat was an old installation. Ra had ordered it built just outside of the Death Rectangle 8,000 years ago, using it for the expeditions into the rectangle he did every 250 years.

But now, Ra was late. There had been no message informing him of a departure, be it delayed or not, and while Mer'tak, Prime of the Rectangle, was not high enough in the ranks to influence Ra's schedule or comm. usage, he had to bear the scorn of the lower gods if his master did not deign to inform them about a delay.

According to the records this wasn't the first time a departure was delayed or no message received, even if standard practice was to send a message the moment his master left Abydos. Still, the situation was different, as the previous times his master had eventually informed Bahlon of the delay and this time, there was an important meeting with Apophis, Heru'ur and Cronus scheduled in six standard months... if Ra wasn't on his way back already, the meeting would have to be rescheduled.

Sweating, Mer'tak ordered to call the "Pride of Ra" via subspace comm. one more time, as he had several times already.

"Master, Supreme Lord Ra does not respond. We only got the standard handshake acknowledged." his communications officer dutifully reported.

Sighing, Mer'tak ordered a long range comm. device to be prepared for a journey through the gate.

**Abydos gate, outside of Nagada**

**Abydonian Commonwealth; August 10, 2156**

As always, gate duty on Abydos was mostly boring. The gate stood in large sets of roofed scaffolding, some of them movable, which were holding up a basic camouflage that would cause a Goa'uld dialing in to think it was still in the pyramid.

Behind the scaffolding, Four tanks and two G-Carriers were dug in, hidden by immovable camouflage and jamming systems on top on the vehicle mounted ones.

This was located in the desert, a kilometer away from the city proper, linked to the confederated barracks and embassy located on the nearby spaceport by an unpaved, curving path; the same kind of path that linked the port to the city. As always, four of the older Abydonian militiamen clad in their traditional garb were with them, sitting on a few stones and talking with their Terran colleagues to practice their English while the soldiers worked on their low Goa'uld skills.

The spaceport was a basic facility consisting of a single terminal, a small tower and a separated warehouse complex nearby, providing jobs for the local population and housing schools as well as a hospital sized to take Nagada into account. Taxiways connected the two buildings with the nine landing pads varying in size from suitable for the smallest jump capable ship to the biggest light cruisers, while being able to do basic repair jobs on everything cruiser-sized or smaller.

They were built with enough starship grade armor that they were technically reentry-rated and retractable roofs including solar cell arrays that had originally been designed with Martian sandstorms in mind before Terra developed the jump drive. Now, they found a new use under Abydos' two merciless suns.

A basic fence and some LASER turrets kept unwanted animals and other visitors from the big area that had been leased from the Abydonians so that the few shuttles and fighters able to be disassembled and pass the gate could be serviced and protected from the fierce local sandstorms while the real downport near New Nagada was still under construction.

Even if the average Abydonian had no reason to believe this, they were looking for fuel in the sky or watching other regions of Abydos that weren't desert. There was desert as far as people could walk and hope to survive. Abydos couldn't be much bigger than that, could it?

Everyone had hoped that Abydos would have been forgotten, but a few of the Terrans had mumbled something about some "Murphy" whenever they looked at the gate. So when the gate engaged unscheduled for the first time in months, everyone was shocked for a moment, if only for a moment, as klaxons brought the soldiers back and com chatter spiked before all went silent again.

The moment the second chevron locked, all gate guard vehicles were ready to fire at whoever came through and wasn't going to be fooled by the disguise. At the same time, the locals scrambled, entering the fake temple and form the first line of defense against any Goa'uld checking on Ra by providing them a false sense of security as apparently all had stayed the same. A sense of security that was reinforced by them being clad like they had been before the fall of Ra.

As it opened, a dark grey sphere half as big as a man floated out of it, connected to the gate by what looked like white light and was covered by a light grey veil for a moment to show a Horus Guard with a silver rectangle inserted onto the birds' forehead.

Slowly, two of the militiamen stepped forward, bowing deeply to keep up the masquerade.

"Kneel, slaves! Where is your god's steward, Master Mer'tak demands to speak him."

They immediately knelt and the boldest of them finally spoke.

"Master, Ra's steward ordered us to give you a message should you demand to speak to him."

"What is it?"

"He ordered us to tell you that his farspeaking magic had been disrupted while the movement spells had some problems. His Divinity is underway, but unable to get in contact with you."

**Bahlon Habitat,**

**Bahlon system, Pel'tak**

**August 10, 2156**

Raging, Mer'tak hit the console and closed the connection.

Ra-damned magic! He knew that it wasn't completely reliable, even if he would never dare to tell it this openly. Well, those peasants couldn't hope to understand it anyway.

But now, he had to deal with Sokar… Growling, he opened another comm. channel. "This is Mer'tak, give me the Chu'alahk." A moment later, a Ha'tak's pel'tak appeared on his screen.

"How can I help you, Prime?" the ship's commander bowed at the screen.

"Set course to Abydos. The slaves there report that Ra's movement spells have problems, and he will be late to his meeting. You are to meet him halfway and bring him back to help reducing this delay as far as possible."

"I live to serve." Suppressing a gulp, the man nodded and closed the channel, relieving Mer'tak a bit. At least now he could tell the minor and… less major gods that he had done everything he could to help, and if it cost him half his Ha'tak allotment it would still be better than having to face Sokar without anything to say in his favor.

**Abydos gate, outside of Nagada**

**Abydonian Commonwealth; August 10, 2156**

Relieved, the guards looked at each other. They had won more time, but no one knew exactly how much.

Now, it was time to prepare. But at least now they knew what these globes were for. And perhaps the Goa'uld wouldn't try to get it back, as that would be more than useful.

**Locker Room, Sol gate facility**

**Mare Moscoviense, about 3,700 kilometers from Luna City**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**August 10, 2156**

SG-1, as the new Unit under Major Littlefield had been named, was standing in their dedicated locker room, a few hundred meters away from the gate cave and browsing through their lockers while Juan Littlefield let his gaze wander over the soldiers. His team. His men.

Of course, there were the members of the original expedition – Dr. Isabella Rodriguez as their "expert" on everything gate-related, Lt. (MC) Amanda LeClerc, their paramedic slash scientist, freshly promoted Master Sergeant Ferretti and Lance Corporal Buntapvekarn, the capturers of the dreadnought.

Then there were the new people. Of course, each of them had combat experience, and Lt. Richter organized the troopers under him expertly. Formerly an employee of Behmer AG, he had enlisted in the 2130s for the first raid on Nusku. Since then, he had earned a lot of respect in the Combat Engineers and was also rated to work with military neodogs. Corporals Smith, Raffarin and Wen also had impressive resumes, but mainly brought their guns to the team.

Seeing how everyone was ready to listen, he spoke up. "Okay, people, time to get ready. Our target today is MP3X-866, as picked by HQ and you all got the briefing data downloaded.

Standard issue for our missions from now on will be the Terran Marine Corps standard combat uniform instead of the Desert Environment Combat Suit, Tactical known as Fremen suit used on the Abydos trip. On top of that, we also get a CG/thruster belt, a gravpack and an 18 hour-air supply tank just in case. Standard weapons load out with grav compensators – advanced combat rifle and a gauss personal defense weapon for close quarters combat.

"We will be accompanied by four tanks, another G-Carrier with an anti-air gun and gate guards. Fighters/CAS is covered by a squadron of Roc fighters.

Now get into the suits, you all just had your refreshers."

Opening his locker, the major checked his equipment, placing CG/thruster belt, loaded grav pack and air tank at their designated docking ports before he climbed into it and checked the seals of the trooper next to him. For a moment, he looked at the black circle with a golden one that had replaced the old unit insignia to not give away too much. It looked nice, in an only slightly threatening way.

Then he opened the Squad view of his TacNet officer account and watched the symbols of his eleven subordinates switching to green… or yellow. "Isabella, you have a suit integrity problem."

Moments of hectic activity later, everything was in order and they marched to the hangar, which wasn't any less crowded and busy as the gate guards were already boarding their G-Carrier, while its gunner loaded an ammo belt into the door-mounted minigun.

Passing two tanks – one with a plasma cannon, another with a railgun – they boarded their Carrier and a bunch of new users entered the TacNet while their door gunner took her seat behind the minigun, signaling SG-1 was ready for its first gate deployment outside of Abydos.

Meanwhile, the Major climbed into the cockpit, taking a seat in the second control seat and turning to address his driver.

Staff Sergeant Sam Middleton had been sentenced to five years in the military for stealing and illegally tuning grav cars, a skill that translated well into G-Carriers and tanks. While he still had some issues with discipline and tended to hit on everything even remotely female and moving, he was one hell of a driver that let nothing come between him and the mission

"Everything in order, Sarge?"

"All green, sir. Everyone has mounted, ammo's all stocked, and gate guards are ready." Middleton switched to TacNet's unit view on the carrier's holoHUD. "Tank platoon and Fighter squad are ready and waiting for the go."

Juan Littlefield nodded. There was only one thing left to do. "Give me the unit."

A green dot began to blink in his view as he was patched into his unit's channel.

"This is Major Littlefield. I have not had the time to speak with all of you today, but I have met all of you in the last weeks - We have trained together, eaten together, and lived together. We are knuckle draggers, airheads, eggheads, treadheads, we are vacuum cleaners. We are Marines. We are all Terrans. We are all humans." His voice grew stern "Mankind has been enslaved for millennia, and we did not know of this. Ra lived here until his slaves revolted, kicked him off Earth and hid the gate. We found it, we killed Ra, and here we are." Raising his voice, he continued. "We can not stay as ignorant as we were. We have to go out and explore. What does the galaxy look like? What wonders, what horrors does it hold? I expect you to do your job. If a bunch of ancients with spears and stones can overcome a 'god' in the right circumstances, I expect better from all of us. But we are but a scouting force. We will ask first, and shoot only when shot at. Terra cannot afford yet another war, especially one incited by a trigger happy marine. I wish us well.

May we find wisdom on the stars. May we find allies in the stars. May we find resources. May we get another chance to fulfill the dream StarLeaper One failed us on."

**Gate room, Sol gate facility **

In the cavern holding the gate, thrusters powered up and pushed the gate back into the vertical while the gravity was lowered back to lunar military standard. It was considered part of basic defense to have the gate only operational at appointed times, and place it in the horizontal otherwise, while an ambient 3G field made sure everyone coming through would fall back right into the gate assuming he managed to somehow beat the iris in the periods between offline mode and troop deployment.

Now, a redesigned probe lowered itself towards the gate. It had lost several scientific instruments, discarding them for a point defense LASER, armor and some basic stealth, while lowering the maximum gravity to be canceled out from 2G to 1.5G.

As soon as the gate engaged, the probe dove into it and disappeared.

All over the base, HUDs and holoscreens lit up, showing a desert under a cloudy sky dominated by what looked like a gas giant. Additional readings showed a thin atmosphere tainted by what appeared to be intense volcanic activity if one was going by the geysers close to the gate.

But the air also indicated a coastal region, and as the probe rose, the video feeds presented several volcanoes and small natural gas fires on tiny hills in the desert bordering an ocean in walking distance from the gate.

**MP3X-866**

**Gate desert**

**August 10, 2156**

As soon as the gate finished dialing, the massive shape of a G-42 grav tank serenely floated through, taking position next to it. Soon after, the rest of SG-1 followed, positioning themselves next to the gate, ready to cover and defend it against anything imaginable. Two rocs were the last to emerge from the event horizon before it collapsed, rising to circle the area and watch for anyone closing in.

"Base, this is one. We are in position. Alpha carrier leaving for in depth check. Reporting back in an hour."

With these words, the major nodded to his driver and Middleton accelerated the massive armored brick of a carrier away from the gate. They would begin with the hills in the east before having a look at the ocean.

An hour later the vehicle slowly floated over the waves, keeping a height that reduced RADAR visibility, but was still too high for most expected shallow water predators at this gravity level to leap out and get their door gunner.

"Sir, I got something. Slow contact at sea level, two o'clock, two kilometers away and headed for the coast. Better take a look yourself."

"Understood." His communicator's video screen came alive, showing a vaguely humanoid object swimming to the coast. "Shadow it to the coast, but keep the distance." Switching to the squad channel, he commented "We detected a lone swimmer heading to the coast and are going to investigate."

Soon after, the team watched the local leave the sea, and stand waiting on the beach. It was blue-skinned, stood about 2 meters high, had webbed feet and hands, looking obviously amphibian to the untrained eye, despite the basic courses for troops being deployed off world that had tried to ingrain the idea that looks could – and most probably would – be deceiving into all of them.

Slowly reducing the distance, they took a closer look. The entity was standing there, looking at the carrier, wearing shoes made of some kind of fish leather that left the toes exposed, clothes made out of what looked like plastic and metal, covered by a loose uneven net made of strings of blue algae that could possibly serve as camouflage. Intense, white eyes with tiny pupils looked at the craft.

As the carrier set down a few hundred meters away, the door gun still being pointed away from the alien. Opening the door, Littlefield jumped out, accompanied by Rodriguez and Ferretti. All of them were prepared professionally, but nobody acted threatening.

Before anyone could say anything, the alien knelt down and drew something in the sand, looking at the humans questioning.

"Okay, anyone got an idea?"

"That's Cuneiform. The Babylonian script, one of the oldest Terran scripts known." Kneeling down, Dr. Rodriguez painted a few other cuneiform glyphs into the sand.

"Babylon? Babili… Goa'uld?" for a moment, they all felt a strange shiver.

"No, we killed the snakes and…" as the alien nodded, she stopped. "Hate Goa'uld. Good. Why war machines, human? Not Goa'uld design." This left them all stunned, as no one noticed a visible translator or expected some alien amphibian to speak English.

Suddenly, Middleton's voice came over the unit's channel, bringing their thoughts back to the problem at hand. "There are two submerged energy signatures diving away from the coast. They're big enough to count as starship grade, and I didn't detect anything before they started to leave! I can't see others, but seeing how I didn't notice the first ones..."

Frowning, Littlefield looked at the ocean, not seeing anything. The alien only looked at him stoically. "War machine pass through gate. We ready to defend."

"Okay, that's sensible." The major nodded. "Sarge, keep the weapons powered down, but ready. Seems to be their gate defense force. And inform the gate guard of _that_ little fact."

"Ack."

"Why not dead? Goa'uld kill tech users. Burn worlds."

"They… glass worlds? Well, we just found the gate recently after millennia. We never heard of the Goa'uld before."

"Never…?" the alien looked at him fiercely. "Speak! Victory fate Omoroca?!"

"Omowho?"

"Babylon." He pointed to the signs "Humans. Know Babylon. Know Omoroca. What fate Omoroca? Victory fate?"

"Victory?"

"Humans are Goa'uld slaves. It's their fate. You are human," - another shiver went down their spines - "but you are not. How did Omoroca win?"

"Who is Omoroca?!"

"You don't remember?"

"Look" the doc stepped in "it's thousands of years ago. Most of the knowledge we had at that time is lost. Yes, I know, a few thousand years is not long, we are a young civilization." It was hard not to know that in the light of both the Ziru Sirka and the Goa'uld "But we lost what we knew."

"You don't remember?" he looked thoughtful. "Ah, yes. I forgot how short lived Tau'ri are, all who saw Omoroca are long dead"

"Thousands of years? You… remember thousands of years? I mean sure, there are history books, but _personally remembering_ them?!"

"I do." his intense gaze cut right through her defenses, and then he continued. "I remember the day Omoroca went to the Tau'ri to defend humans. I was there."

Shocked silence was only broken by a whispered "You were…?" until the Major cut in. "Sorry, you must be mistaken. I know no Tau'ri. We are Terrans."

"Ter-ra? I do not know such a people, but Babylon was a Tau'ri city."

"Well, we renamed us, then. Tends to happen over the millennia, you know. What does it even _mean_?"

"It means _first ones_ or _those from the first world_, where humanity came from."

"And you lived then?"

"Yes. I am 6,000 tau'ri years old."

"Ha! That will show those 'ancient' bastards! Humans are from Terra and they're not the oldest on the block!"

As the Major turned around, the Marine in the background that had loudly commented this winced, shrinking visibly.

As Littlefield looked back to the alien, he shook his head. "I'm afraid we don't get that old. We don't know it."

"Yes, you do. It's hidden deep inside your minds. But we can free it."

Rodriguez perked up; practically bouncing with anticipation "You can… free memories about Babylon? Where do I have to sign?"

"What is 'to sign'?"

"Oh, it's just a saying." she blushed "I mean, you can free my memories."

"It will hurt you. May even kill you."

"As long as it is recorded, I'm willing to risk it."

"You might be." the major stepped in "But I am not. What does it gain us to tell you about Babylon? I'm okay with telling you history facts in a nice conversation, but I'm _not_ okay with losing a team member just because she wanted to answer questions unrelated to… anything! No. Wait. Let's start even _simpler_! Who are you? Why should we trust you?"

Nem smiled. "Those are good questions, human. You have nothing to fear. I am Nem. I am what you would call a scientist, and I am supporting our fight against the Goa'uld for thousands of years. Omoroca was my mate, and she went to Tau'ri to do this. She was in Babylon. I have not heard of her for thousands of your years. But if I look at you, she might not have failed. There might still be humans that are no slaves."

"Slaves? What do you mean, slaves? We're the dominate species!" Ferretti answered, nonplussed.

"I'm afraid not. It is humanity's fate to serve the Goa'uld."

"Don't be silly. We're not slaves to the Goa'uld – we kill them. Just like Singh killed that little bugger Ra."

"Ra? You killed Ra? Humans killed Ra?!" Laughter filled the room. "That's a good one. Do know any other…" he stocked. "You are not joking. The one you call Singh killed Ra. Do you know what you have done, humans?!"

"Well, we freed Abydos from a dictator and prevented him from going to Terra."

"Yes. Of course. And you dare call _me_ silly. Ra was the Supreme System Lord. He was the closest thing to the ruler of the galaxy in existence. The moment the lower System Lords and other Goa'uld learn of this, the succession wars will begin, dooming millions of Jaffa and even more humans. Humans are slaves of the Goa'uld. The Goa'uld destroy any world that develops enough to become a threat to them and keep their slaves at a low technological level. Presumably like the one you found on Abydos. And they own many of the thousands of worlds that have a gate, scavenging what's there, and then moving to another place that looks promising."

Shocked, the humans looked at each other as Nem continued. "Congratulations. You just lit a galaxy-sized bomb. Not that it was peaceful before, but now the most powerful of them is dead… But yes, you earned your name. Ter-ra. Ra's terror."

"The galaxy just got a lot more interesting… Chinese interesting…" Dr. Rodriguez mumbled.

Nem smiled at the major. "Indeed. You see, this is not unrelated and would not be for nothing. If you can tell me what happened to my mate, I will tell you about the Goa'uld. We have been fighting them for millennia; you don't even know the basic structure of galactic politics. We have tried to help you, humans. We will tell you about the System Lords, the Jaffa, and their structure. We will tell you of their fortresses and their minor worlds where you could possibly be successful." His smile made him look like a predator. "We will give you a chance to fight for your freedom, human. And all of this for the small risk of losing a team member that agreed to take the risk upon her. What do you say, human?"

"You… have a point, but she seriously needs an escort. The doctor is part of my team, and I will not have her go into a dangerous situation unprotected." the major insisted, throwing a fierce look at the doctor. "Ferretti, Buntap, LeClerc, you're with her. We'll follow you on the surface, as the carrier isn't designed with hydrodynamics in mind. It's underwater, right? Anyway, how far away is this place? We only have air for 18 hours"

Nem presented another vaguely shark-like smile at that. "Yes, it is underwater. You will be back in an environment allowing you to breathe in…" he concentrated a moment. "about an hour if you are as fast as your ship there."

The Major nodded, opening a channel to the Carrier and the gate guard. "This is major Littlefield. We encountered potential allies using extremely capable stealth systems and possessing extensive knowledge of the Goa'uld and the political situation in the galaxy. There are starship grade reactors in the water we only noticed when they allowed us to do so, so try not to piss off the locals. Fortunately, they appear friendly. Dr. Rodriguez will accompany one of them into his lab with an escort. It is undersea, so she won't be able to radio anyone for several hours. We stay on the surface."

"Acknowledged. We will not shoot at anything, but dial home and inform base."

"Do so."

Nem nodded. "Follow me, then."

All three soldiers and Dr. Rodriguez nodded, then the five of them stepped into the sea. While the alien swam, the four Terrans used their thruster packs and contragrav units to keep up with him.

After a long while of swimming through schools of fish and the local equivalents of kelp forests, they noticed a collection of domes illuminating the sea in the distance. The buildings were guarded by fierce-looking, obviously artificial shapes emitting white light swimming all around them. It didn't take long to reach them and step through a curtain of water into a dry, if somewhat humid, room.

The inner surfaces of the thick walls were made of what looked like some kind of plastic and covered with blue algae-like structures similar to those the alien's clothes were covered with. One wall differed from the others, being covered by a metal framework. While the room was filled with an atmosphere of the same composition as the one on the surface, it was humid, being moisturized by a curious series of transparent spheres, pipes and other ornamental elements circulating bubbling water through the room.

Strange plants on a table next to different scientific-looking instruments as well as a machine consisting of a metal frame that looked like a canopy from a scrap yard, but equipped with an uncomfortable looking chair and a strange device looking like some futuristic gun mounted behind the headrest, evoked the picture of a laboratory. As Ferretti suspiciously eyed the surroundings, Isabella pointed to the chair. "That's what we're going to use?"

"Yes, if you agree. As I already stated, it is painful and potentially deadly."

"I know. How… does it work?"

"This device reads the subconscious memories your ancestors left you. While human ancient memory is not strong enough to surface, it can influence dreams, and so we can read it." He smiled reassuringly "Are you ready?"

"As… ready as I will ever be…" She turned to her guards, taking off the helmet and handing it over "Ferretti, Buntap… If something happens… Please tell Ska'ara I love him."

"We will, doc, we will." The sergeant nodded sympathetically, then got deadly serious. "Are you sure you really want to do this?"

"Are you kidding? I'm an archaeologist by training. Getting knowledge about the past is a prize in itself, and we will get information important to the war if I do this. I'm sure many others will follow me to explore our 'ancient memories', if this is successful. This will revolutionize historic research! And help us to free humanity from slavery. But… Thanks for asking." She smiled openly at the sergeant, who nodded and looked away. Then she took a deep breath, then turned back to Nem. "Okay, what do I have to do?"

"First of all." LeClerc cut in "I need a risk assessment." After a short discussion with Nem, she nodded. "Okay, I can prepare for that."

A few moments later, Isabella was placed correctly on the chair while blue beams of light touched for her head and LeClerc prepared her equipment in case it was needed. Closing her eyes, she began to mumble with a concentrated look on her face.

"Omoroca." She moaned in pain. "Omoroca" Suddenly, she gasped and began to speak again. "And in that place there was Omoroca… A woman who came forth from the heavenly egg…"

With a small cry, she stopped "I… I can't! Can't remember! The PAIN!"

Nem's hands came closer, but she interjected. "No! Don't stop! She who fought for Terra's freedom needs to be remembered!"

Lieutenant LeClerc just nodded. "It's painful, but her biomonitor says she is okay. From a medical standpoint, you can go on."

Moved by her willingness to endure this for his mate, Nem turned the machine to a higher level, earning him a yell and a louder whine of the machine. The soldiers looked at each other. It was hard to respect the Doctor's wishes, but apparently she was not harmed and only experienced pain, and she had a rock solid point. Whoever helped humanity against harsh odds deserved to be remembered.

"Who walked among men by day…but at night…she would retreat to the great sea to sleep." She gasped again "'One of the beings called Oannes…"

"That's right…. But I did not know they knew of more…" Nem sounded deeply moved at this personal sacrifice.

"Omoroca… I need more! A place, a name, anything."

"Belus." Nem turned the machine into yet another adjustment, making the pitch and lights painful themselves.

Rodriguez grimaced in pain, then it poured out of her.

"ARGH… The God Belus came down unto Babylon…onto the place of Omoroca…and cut the woman asunder!" gasping she stopped "Oh God! Unh! Oh God, he killed her! No more! There is no more! Stop! "

Nem and the soldiers exchanged shocked looks, and then the Lance Corporal stormed forward to free the gasping, crying doctor while Nem deactivated the machine. Immediately, Ferretti handed her a drink that had been standing on one of the tables and drank it greedily while LeClerc looked up from her readouts. "You're deep yellow, nearly orange. You're basically just extremely weakened. Sounds like good news."

Nodding, Isabella tried to sit up, but she had to be supported. She turned to Nem and saluted. "Sir, humanity stands deep in your deb..." she noticed a dangerous look on Nem's face. It was the look of a killer, and as his mind was clear enough, the Oanne threw his head back, screaming with grief and rage for seconds. "I am no warrior. But Belus IS DEAD!" calming down a bit, he turned back to the Terrans. "I'm sorry. This was not directed at you. We better go back to your team now."

**Gate area**

**MP2X-338**

**November 1, 2156**

A probe left the gate, slowly rising into the sky and sending the data back to Luna. There were no radio waves, no neutrino emissions, no signs of any high technology whatsoever, so it soon entered a preplanned search pattern.

It took only minutes to find a small town including a standalone temple and a partially collapsed ziggurat, and as the camera zoomed at the doors, bringing up the genesis story of Marduk, it was clear that Russia had made a very interesting find back in 1999, even if it had only recently been identified. Yet another Goa'uld had been detected, and this world was immediately scheduled for a visit by the next available SG-team, which happened to be SG-3.

**Madison, West Virginia**

**United States of America, Terra, Terran Confederation**

**November 10, 2156**

"They're gone, Sir. No one's been in that house for at least a month." A member of the FBI's SWAT team called on the team's tactical channel as the two dozen men clad in full combat uniforms and their three equally sealed and armored neodogs appeared behind a window.

Special Agent Gibbs was hard pressed not to yell as he got that report. "Are you telling me we have a freely roaming Goa'uld?!" calming down after a minute, he asked "Well, what did we find?"

"Rings leading to the basement, two of those coiled snake guns, three staffs and two helmets on pikes that spit some green smoke specialist Rover reports as smelling extremely offensive; suspects it's a C-weapon of some kind. Good we brought the full suits – we'll stay inside until everything's decontaminated."

"Understood." Cursing, Gibbs changed the channel and connected to HQ. "Report to Argus: We lost him. Seth was not at home. Apparently, he fled last month in a hurry, as he left a few interesting things at home, including a ring transporter. The neodog unit reports a suspected chemical attack. Requesting decontamination and special needs ambulance units immediately."

**Pel'tak Ha'tak Chu'alahk**

**Halfway to Abydos**

**November 10, 2156**

Jer'get was nervous. As the prime commanding the Ha'tak assigned to meet Ra halfway, he had tried to prepare himself to face an angry god. What he wasn't prepared for was nothing.

"Nothing?"

"No, Master. The sensors show no sign of our god being on his way. Not for several days of travel out."

"Hail the Pride again."

"Yes, Master." Moments passed, but nothing happened. "Master, the farspeaker says it is still on Abydos."

"WHAT?!"

"They… did not leave the planet, master."

"Get me Bahlon!"

**Pel'tak Ha'tak Chu'alahk**

**Halfway to Abydos**

**November 12, 2156**

"Kre'ta! Why did you dare to call me to the pel'…"

"I did." On the screen, there was a silvery face. Pure trinium formed a helmet depicting an animal never seen on Earth. It had big, catlike eyes, big movable ears and a mouth with hand long, sharp teeth located below a trunk that moved as if it were a snake.

Immediately, the ship prime fell to his knees.

"You may rise, warrior. Bahlon informed me the Supreme System Lord hasn't left Abydos. Tell me everything you know."

"Yes, enchanter. Your wish is my command." Rising slowly, the Jaffa explained everything he knew to this figure of legend.

Listening intently, the enchanter priest only snorted. "You were fooled. Somehow, the slaves outsmarted you. Which apparently isn't all that difficult. Go to Abydos and check what happened there. Punish the infidels, if necessary. And BRING BACK OUR GOD."

"Yes, Master."

"Dismissed."

**Command center, Fortress world,**

**Somewhere deep in Ra's domain**

**November 12th, 2156**

Sighing, the priest of Ra turned away from the comm. terminal "Inform everyone. The warriors at Bahlon managed to lose contact to our god and not inform ANYONE for three months! Remind me why Bahlon was handed over to THEM?"

"Sokar's burning garden! The meeting has to be delayed!" Below him, dozens of heads just like his own turned around and started to prepare this world to the chaos that would follow this news.

**Abydos system,**

**37.4 AU from main star**

**December 6th, 2156**

Space in the outer system of Abydos' main star protested briefly as eight bubbles of hyperspace collapsed and spit out the next step in upgrading Abydos. A Hardrada-class commerce raider, a Zheng He-class explorer, three imperial bulk freighters captured at Nusku, filled to bursting with everything the colony would need but wasn't gate-transportable and two Terran Jupiter-class tankers, escorted by a Galaxy-class attack cruiser appeared in the darkness of space, maneuvering back into their pre-jump formation. After spotting and identifying Abydos, the latter immediately pointed its massive comm. array there while launching a squadron of fighters.

"Abydos control, this is Andromeda group. Requesting refueling directions and permission to start a detailed system survey. High Command requested to tell you St. Nicholas has a brought you all some gifts. Transmitting manifest now. Andromeda, over."

They would not enter one of the systems' gas giants without permission for several reasons. First, they had the time as they didn't plan to leave the system any time soon.

Then, the Abydonian Commonwealth was considered a sovereign nation and therefore anything within half a parsec of the Abydonian suns was their property. Which was another reason to stay clear as the locals were still too used to life in a desert to allow foreigners to "steal their water".

Last but not least, there were stories from the depths of imperial space about civilizations hiding deep inside the clouds of gas worlds, only to strike out against poor ships on refueling operations racing through their homes at high speed.

Of course, most considered this simply spacer's yarn, but explorers into the unknown were willing to check for everything. Who the hell would have believed in Goa'uld just two years ago, for example?

**Abydos gate, outside of Nagada**

**Roughly five hours later **

In the Abydonian desert, the gate activated and a standard Terran ID code was sent through while the message arrived at the local tower. As soon as the scaffolding had been opened and the fake stairs moved away, twelve G-Carriers drove towards the city followed by an air/raft which stopped at the guard post.

A soldier jumped out, grabbed inside and handed over a care package with some Chocolate and a cigar to each guard. "There normally is beer included, I'll tell the quartermaster so you can pick them up after duty."

"Thanks, what's that for?"

"St. Nicholas Day." The soldier grinned "Colonel Schmidt of gate logistics organized this as soon as it was clear the Andromeda group would arrive on December 6th. If you don't want it, I'll gladly take the beer instead of handing it over…"

"No way in HELL. Thanks, man."

"So, these Carriers were full of…?"

"Chocolate, candy, some toys… A civilian core." He grew more solemn. "And of course more doctors and medical gear. With the Mastadge flu cases rising here and at home, the Secretary wants to make damn sure we don't commit accidental genocide."

Ignoring the blazing suns, the temperature fell a few degrees. "Can't say I disagree… Got any news from Nusku?"

"Nah, we just finally cleared the core. But there's already a bunch of Health Ministry observers there to check the situation and coordinate an emergency if necessary. The rumor mill says they've got a lot of wonder drugs, including a super-antibiotic, but other than that their medicine is downright primitive. Hard to reconcile that with all their shiny high tech, but that's life."

"Guess so. But I'd like to see that core. Man, just imagine. The impies have that crap for three thousand years and do anything but perfect it, step for step, only to fill a giant database with it." He shook his head "I just hope this stuff includes something to keep shipboard coffee from tasting like recycled water."

"Ha, fat chance. But the _real_ thing includes all their yard and ship designs." He shook his head. "Putting that in the same database as the designs for a _coin_… Be that as it may, there are already hundreds of paper pushers going all over the military core, looking for weak spots. It's just that they took the time to eliminate those, too, I guess… But at least now we know their full jamming protocols and methodology." He concluded with a feral grin.

**Abydos system,**

**Another roughly five hours later**

On the Andromeda's bridge, a speaker came to life. "Andromeda group, this is Abydos control. You can use the any of the gas giants for refueling, but please conduct a detailed analysis while doing so. We are recommending Rakhlan – before you ask, it's named after an important Abydonian ancestor. It's the smallest of the three. The Commonwealth asked us to have a look at Langford - its Io expy - for mineable materials. We're transmitting the preliminary analysis results now. And WELCOME to Abydos! Abydos control, over."

Relieved laughter filled the bridge at hearing this. It was still audible as the channel to Abydos was opened again. "I'm afraid we have to jump again," captain Ngonga answered "normal transit would take us more than seventeen days. But it's good to finally hear some voices that don't belong to our crews. Andromeda, over."

**Abydos starport,**

**December 14th, 2156**

Finally, they had arrived.

All the people of Abydos stood around the fence enclosing the Terran base and watched in awe as the shapes of three ships silently lowered themselves onto the reinforced landing pads of the base like feathers.

When the ships touched the ground, the people of Abydos had their first look at a starship that wasn't Goa'uld.

200 Meters long and four stories high, they were wedge-shaped and parked on their landing gear as if they did not mass tens of thousands of tons.

One of them sported a gun that was big enough to stand in and they all had several turrets pointing into the sky, with only one of them on each ship pointing towards the gate.

Then, the behemoths opened. Ramps slid to the ground and doors opened, spitting out a constant stream of Terrans in the stuff the Terrans gave to their soldiers to protect them from the suns while smaller ships and ground cars swarmed around the big ships, docking everywhere and doing Terran stuff.

Sha'ala stood in the spectators' front row, watching it in awe. She had seen the same busy activity at all the Terran ports she had visited, but to see it here at home… Still, it was not enough to prevent her from making a mental note to get some proper clothes for Juan. If she wore Terran clothes, as nice as they were, he could wear something that had been proven over centuries. At least off duty. Her father would like it, too.

Ten smaller craft passed through her view, racing to the three ships in orbit that could not land and hope to lift again. These were bringing the real goods, but even the three ships that stood in front of her were important.

A group of marines mounted a big tube on another tube coming out of one of the ships called "tankers", connecting them to the big tanks hidden under dunes on the starport while the more courageous Nagadans approached their new visitors, trying to greet them in more or less broken English.

A small child cried in fear of these metal monstrosities, which caught the attention of one of the newcomers, who came over and made funny faces for it until it calmed down. Then he handed its mother a bit of chocolate, earning a thankful look.

A moment later, other kids surrounded him begging for more chocolate, which caused roaring laughter from the visitors.

Back at the ships, some Nagadans were selling roasted Rolak meat, hoping these Terrans were as fed up with the ship food as their compatriots had made them believe.

Like her, the Nagadans hadn't exactly gotten used to the idea of money yet, but they weren't stupid, either. While the exact reasons Terrans were using small devices to transfer numbers between them wasn't understood, it was clear that _having_ those numbers was a good thing as it meant getting Terran things without having to find something the seller actually wanted.

So, after understanding that the numbers were only valid when gained a certain way, it had not taken long until the embassy had had to open a branch of the Confederated Bank and hand out basic perscomps with e-banking programs, while the classes in English and basic math got a strong influx of adults. Ancient Egypt writing still attracted a sizable crowd, but not nearly as many as the things used to deal with the Confederation.

So it came that, while most meat dealers needed to be bartered with, some of them simply accepted cashless payment in Solars. And those were almost monopolizing the trade.

**Abydos orbit **

The Marco Polo, a ship formerly known as Kaanukir Nusku-Dingir-345 hung with open cargo holds in the sky over Nagada. The blocky design had never been intended to operate anywhere but on an imperial highport. This was economically sound; such a port was able to unload the freighter's cavernous holds that would have easily held a tall apartment building in less than a day. But here, everything was different as crewmen in civilian powered suits were busy shoving the first layer of loose goods into the waiting containers that had been shipped disassembled in a smaller cargo bay next to the voluminous cargo bay to be used in transporting things from orbit. Those, as well as bigger cargo, were then loaded onto grav lifters or workpods that would transport them down to the surface.

A cold voice pierced the void. "Container A-145: Two complete ship's workshops, disassembled. Unloaded and on its way. Attention all hands, we are free to release the central fabber core for New Nagada."

The cargo doors were now fully extended and everyone made sure to be somewhere else as a new pair of grav lifters maneuvered out a 28 meter high structure ten meters on a side, not counting the robotic arms holding several contragrav emitters. They were followed by several workpods, moving a pair of 1.2GW fusion reactors ripped from small Vilani freighters captured at Nusku and its automated factory and other transporting units carrying elemental but voluminous parts of a robotic factory able to construct everything in the Terran tech base.

Down on the surface, many smaller elements of the factory had already been either built on site or shipped through the gate and assembled. It only needed its core and the power plants to start operation.

"Okay guys" the cold voice came back once they had cleared the hold "Next stage: Clearing out part bravo of the high port, I see the Hanseatic League has already pushed out part Alpha."

**Orbit above Cimmeria**

**December 16, 2156**

Space exploded in white and blue light, and five ships slowed down to a stop in moments. Four of them where the infamous shapes of an Asgard Beliskner, while the last was positively gigantic, carrying more weapon emplacements than all four of its smaller escorts combined.

As the Valhalla opened all channels, it did not care about the galaxy listening in.

"Supreme Commander Thor, this is Commander Aegir of Task Force Valhalla. We have reached Cimmeria."

Thus, the first Valkyrie battle cruiser assumed its station in the Milky Way. Moments later, 26 other task forces confirmed their arrival.

The great bluff was no longer necessary.

**A/N:** I added an „M" to the show's designation for everything in the Milky Way. This sounded logical for me and while no one knows if there are gates in other galaxies, I think it can't hurt.

I'll use the same planet naming algorithm as Sam Carter claimed they used in universe. There's no need to reinvent these, after all.

According to the rank tables, a Lance Corporal is located between Cpl. and Sergeant in both the Terran Army and Marines. So Buntap was not demoted in thanks for capturing that ship.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter five**

**LEO, Terra**

**Terran Confederation**

**August 10, 2156**

TerraGPR XIII and XIV slowly made their rounds around the planet, spaced at a distance small enough to consider them a single object when thinking in orbital distances. Maneuver drives and compact fusion reactors had made fuel restrictions a thing of the past a century ago, and the Vilani attack of 2148 had cleared nearly all satellites in Sol, most of them being collateral damage, but a few shot down by frustrated gunners as the Vilani were forced to break orbit and go deal with problems at home.

This had been a severe blow to post-nuke Terra, but, not unlike it had been to post WWII Germany, it was a blessing in disguise. With all the "old" technology gone, there was no need to hold back and deploy less than state of the art technology, allowing them to reap the full benefits deploying infrastructure at the Vilani tech level allowed.

Leisurely, the satellites changed their orbit after getting the final order from Terran Traffic Control. As they passed over a region of Egypt long forgotten before a certain find in Chicago, strong ground penetrating RADAR was activated, creating crispy 3D pictures of a certain temple, the surface area close to it and their subterranean features. As they bore a "top secret" flag, they were stored for the next ARGUS download instead of being sent down to ground control.

**ARGUS Headquarters**

**Geneva, Switzerland, Earth**

**August 15, 2156**

Agent Wyrsch closed the reports about a suspected former Goa'uld site near Cairo that had been found to be utterly devoid of anything.

Opening the files about yet another temple, he found himself standing in a true to scale holographic representation of the square kilometer scan.

Just moments after zooming to the actual temple, he gasped. Directly behind the temple, there was an artificial structure hidden below ten meters of sand. It would not have raised many eyebrows only five years ago, but the Goa'uld contact and the first use of military ground penetration RADAR evolved from mature military RADARs expected to be useful on an interstellar battlefield flooded with ECM, produced images orders of magnitude more useful than the systems and databanks used previously.

A Naquadah signature was a sure telltale. After marking it, calling up the relevant GPS coordinates and checking the object against pattern recognition software using a warbook modified by what they had been able to extract from the yacht's computers, he informed his superior.

**Ancient temple**

**Somewhere in Egypt, Earth**

**August 29, 2156**

Two G-Carriers patiently floated next to the old temple as other vehicles improved the satellite GPR picture by a real time short range high resolution scan.

On their screens, the inner parts of the temple lit up, with several regions clearly discernible from others. "This" Abdul Moawat, representative of the Egyptian Ministry of State for Antiquities, an organization rapidly moving from the museums to the front lines in an unexpected war, pointed to a circle of denser materials in the temple's ceiling "is suspected to be a ring transporter."

The soldiers in front of him all were former Terran Army soldiers that had answered the Ministry's call for personnel after the nature of the old pantheon had been made public. Consisting mostly of Egyptians, the squad was ready to kill anyone that possessed the gall to enslave their ancestors, even as they were proud to know they evicted a high tech alien with spears. As the list of known Goa'uld also included Athena and Ares, the platoon included a few Greek and Italian soldiers that were as pissed off at the Goa'uld as their Egyptian comrades.

But as this was connected to Osiris and Isis, it was a mainly Egyptian matter.

"There also seems to be something small in here" he pointed to another part of the temple "as the RADAR can't penetrate it. It any case, there is a layer of what is probably a Naquadah/Trinium hull beneath the stone."

While the briefing went on, the scan was finished and a platoon of Army Engineers began to dig out the strange, as of now unidentified, object.

**New Nagada**

**Karsa plains, Abydos coastal grasslands, Abydonian Commonwealth**

**December 14th, 2156**

Slowly, the grav tugs approached the construction site of the new city, a mess of tower cranes, exoskeleton workers and other tugs.

Terran Architects had used their considerable experience to create a jewel of a city - while the buildings still were more utilitarian than ornate in the typical Terran style, they had taken every pain to fit them into the landscape seamlessly, which was made easier by not having to accommodate wheeled vehicles or, despite the uneasiness of the more traditional Abydonians, animal transport. Transportation was by grav vehicle, slidewalk or foot, leading to broad stretches of grass between the buildings, with slidewalks directly next to the blocks.

Groves, single boulders and small lakes had simply been integrated into the street grid.

In the center of the city, there was a square kilometer of unchanged plains, surrounded by governmental and other central buildings only five stories tall.

Close by, on the coast, a vast harbor was growing to permit further exploration of the planet. Still, it was more an offshoot of the starport being built next to it, its main function as of now being to allow water landings for starships. Having space to grow on a hundred square kilometers of land gifted by the Commonwealth, it would rival major Terran starports once it had been completed.

Which was a good thing, as this would be the center of exploration and colonization in the trailing parts of Confederation and Commonwealth. The only problem with this was that no one on Abydos would allow ships to draw fuel from the ocean and everything had to be imported from the system's gas giants, making water landings less attractive.

But this was not where the factory would be located. Somewhat outside the city, an area the size of a small town had been covered by concrete, filled with fabrication units, warehouses, mining robots, communication equipment and conveyor bands, all grouped around four holes.

One of the holes was their target.

Carefully, the tugs lowered the central fabbing core into the hole designed for it, as they had already done with the four fusion reactors used to power the complex. At a programmed height, the core's robot arms let go of the CG units helping to keep it afloat and sank into its prepared place. Driven by auxiliary energy that was soon to be depleted, the arms began to link it into the grids feeding it power, feedstock and data.

The first thing loaded into the core were the state of the factory and the contents of the warehouses filled with feedstock and factory parts. A moment later, a self replication program was started, and the factory began to build all the parts Abydos had been unable to construct before. While this factory was not in any way a big investment for the Confederation, there was no way to deploy it by gate, which made it valuable in itself.

This was the moment Abydos changed from a dependent world to a planet potentially able to support the full Terran tech base, and, as the imperial core was loaded into the factory's blueprint collection, it was also able to build everything known to the Ziru Sirka and not blocked by the Terran Confederation. Which excluded mostly warship designs and nuclear weapons.

**K'Tau village, K'Tau**

**December 16, 2156**

It had been a day of hard work for Elran and the others. As they came back into their huts, the Flamen handed out today's rations, accompanied by small prayers to Freyr, even if the lords' rules and ban on them grew stronger every year.

**Valkyrie class Ölrún**

**High orbit, K'Tau**

**December 17, 2156 **

"There appear to have been significant changes on K'Tau. The rest of the task force confirmed this. There is a village at the estimated level we expected the K'Tau at, but… this second village here is smaller, better developed and contains a few hundred life signs, while the original K'Tau village is deserted. Lifesigns from the unexpected village do not match the expected genetic profile of K'Tau natives and are… escorting the K'Tau the mine, while staying apart from them most of the time. This has been confirmed to happen on four local days."

Augvald nodded as he listened to his shipmind's comments. This was unexpected to say the least. "Raise the other ships."

A moment later, all four of the other ship commanders appeared on his screen.

"What do you think about these readings?"

"I think K'Tau has been invaded." Eirik, commander of the Hugin, answered.

"Impossible. I do not detect Goa'uld. Not even any Naquadah." Chelno, the Munin's captain announced.

"And yet, they seem to have degenerated into a master/slave society, with the masters from a different genetic group than the people who were here at last report." A holographic picture appeared, showing haggard workers controlled by well fed masters armed with guns that whipped them whenever they did not work hard enough. It changed to the workers being herded into the barracks, given an insufficient amount of food and some of them being singled out for beatings.

Then, it changed to a well lit room that held a comfortable chair containing a man looking like the slave masters outside, but in better clothes and with a generally more cultured look. There were books, solar powered crystal readers and other artifacts.

"We managed to break into that reader device. These people are refugees from another world the K'Tau took in, only to become their slaves after the people here showed their superior weapons. They do not have real aims as a civilization, but want to live as rich slave masters." Augvald stated.

Eirik added "I have to agree. They even tore down the temple portal to the hologram room, and its logs report no interaction for over a century. Last log entry reports the arrival of advanced strangers they took in as guests." his look grew fierce "The gate address they came from is noted, and it had been connected to several times at the time of last contact. Someone attacked a protected planet. We can not allow this, even if it was no Goa'uld."

The other Asgard nodded. "Ölrún, raise Freyr and send the data to the Council."

**K'Tau village, K'Tau**

**December 17, 2156**

The next day, Elran and the other K'Tau were herded out of the huts as usual, and as the guards started to bring them to the mine, white light appeared in front of them, spitting out a giant Human, clad in metal armor wielding an ornate double axe.

Then the man spoke in a deep voice. **"I am Freyr. You will let my people go."**

The overseer snorted. "Stop the masquerade. You will work like all the others."

"**So be it."**

And with a shrieking tone, white light pierced the heavens, swiping the overseers away. Moments later, other beams of white light emerged from the sky, leaving only pristine grounds and a few confused prisoners and frightened collaborators where the newcomers and their houses had been before their atoms had been beamed into K'Tau's solar wind.

"**You are free again."**

**K'Tau orbit**

A moment later, a hyperspace window opened and the Hugin accelerated towards the suicidal world that had dared to mess with the Asgard.

**Ocean floor  
Heliopolis  
December 16th, 2156  
**

****The gate activated, and a beam of energy was sent through, only to refract at contact with the water. Moments later, a small camera drone came through, immediately starting to transmit data while slowly turning as its hull was attacked by the water. But before it could complete its scan, an aquatic predator that would have made Megalodon jealous ate it.

**Orbit above Galar**

**December 17, 2156**

Space exploded in white and blue light, and another Asgard task force slowed down to a stop in moments.

This was were the similarities to the events over Cimmeria ended, though.

Instead of a pristine orbit, this one was very much populated by massive stations and scores of ships cruising to the moon closest too it, the Hydrogen mining operations on the gas giant it orbited, or deeper into the system.

And in front of the Valkyria class Hrist, a small ship bearing red-white-blue markings acted like a deer in the headlights, the crew frozen in shock. Just a moment later, yelling on the command channels brought them back into action, causing them to join the comm. chatter that had spiked the moment the hyperspace window opened. For a moment, they frantically tried to target the Asgard ships with their RADAR, failing utterly due to the Hrist's stealth.

"This is the Galaran Orbital Patrol cutter Marell to the unknown ships, you are violating Galaran orbital space! State your intentions!"

Five Asgard looked at each other over their holocomms, being as stunned as the locals who couldn't find memories covering something close to this event, be it in their own experiences or in the ones they got implanted in training.

Thankfully, someone aboard the Marell seemed to have come to their senses as the small ship stopped attempting to target the Task Force with every sensor they could find

Meanwhile, calls to Asgard High Command only got their secretaries as the Council was in session to deal with both the K'Tau and Heliopolis developments.

**Eurondan high orbit**

**December 20, 2156**

Space ruptured, colorfully protesting, then spitting out the Hugin. Powerful sensors looked for the gate and the people that dared to offend Freyr.

It was immediately clear that something was very, very wrong here.

The Hugin's shipmind, the brain scan of an old Asgard scientist, started an immediate analysis. "This world was clearly terraformed to Ancient standards, but its atmosphere is now poisonous, and there are only a few scattered domed cities with no land interlinks, although there are clear signs of a war between several societies no older than two or three Terran centuries, mainly the ruins of several domed cities. There is a structure with the gate, but it's only a partially collapsed cave system with some artificially created and reinforced structures as well as a few hundred inhabitants and the remains of a survival package, as well as poison tanks and pumps.

Locking into their net…

Translating…

Apparently, these people flooded the atmosphere with poison gas to commit genocide because of racial ideology. They had a shield system, but the dome cities managed to bomb them into submission and some of them fled to K'Tau. Confirmed. The last big attack coincides with the loss of contact to K'Tau. Scanner readings support this story, as does the analysis of the people inside this gate cave. I think this story is correct."

"So you're sure we found the aggressors?"

"Affirmative."

"Then... let's give them some fresh air."

In every inhabited region of the surface, holograms of the Asgard commander appeared, beginning to speak immediately. **"I am Eirik of the Asgard. We found this address to be the source of people enslaving our protegees… Something they will regret for the rest of their lives. Which, ****while short, will still be longer than the time we allowed the slave masters on K'Tau to live. You do NOT cross the Asgard."**

Eirik disappeared, to be replaced with the picture of the ground above the Eurondan gate cave system. Suddenly, white rays came from the sky, dissolving anything they touched, causing tens of thousands of cubic meters of rock to disappear, steadily eating their way into the underground base. Then, the ceilings were beamed away and poisonous gas sank down into the tunnels, granting every survivor in a slow, painful death.

"**Stay away from our worlds. We will not repeat this warning. This is how you shall identify them."** And with that, pictures of the Asgard symbols were transmitted before the Hugin turned around, diving into hyperspace once again.

In the Breeder cities, the population watched as they saw their former tormentors die. None of their cities was touched, but the sudden appearance of those "Asgard" and the warning they had issued left them in between joy to be free of their attackers and fear of the unknown aliens that had so freely brought death and judgment over them.

**Hidden Tok'ra base**

**Somewhere in the coreward/spinward Ziru Sirka**

**January 1st 2157**

Joren took the datadisk out of the player, putting it into a protective case. "It reached us via undercover agent from the trailing rim after they conquered a major imperial world belonging to a suppressed subculture."

"**Can we use this both ways?" **A deep voice answered.

"Yes, father."

"**Then I will contact the High Council."**

"A sound decision. Still, this is troubling." Menek stated. "Tau'ra now has a chappa'ai and the Rectangle is open."

"Three, even. And Access to Abydos" Joren answered. "They call themselves Terra now."

"Terra. Tau'ra now has a chappa'ai and names itself in Ancient. This of course explains the imperial failure to box them in." with a smile, he added "Good. It would have been a shame to have them succumb to their boring culture."

"Boring and slow. It took this data over two years to cross the Empire!"

"Yes, even a naval courier would only have shaved off a few months with their bad FTL drive. Besides, this is a total out of context problem for them, and they're even worse than other people with those. We're lucky those… 'kirmashaggur', subject races and the frontier legion transmitted it core- and spinwards."

"Anyway. I heard the rimward subruler nearly nuked Terra to the stone age."

"Only to turn heel to eradicate a coup d'etat by the local powers."

"**We have to curse and thank the old Vilani. I have never seen social engineering on quite this scale. While it is quite an accomplishment to keep a Human society in check so well for so long, the Empire is totally unprepared to Ra's death. Forcing your children to live this dull life... Forcing them to become unable to resist the System Lords, even if you do not know about their existence... It is inexcusable."**

"Yes. Fortunately, the Ziru Sirka will never expend all its might against Tau'ra. And this won't change anything from the imperial point of view."

"**And we will keep it that way. They killed Ra. This earns them our eternal gratitude."**

"Yes, father." The men in this room answered, causing Marnon to nod. **"We have to use the chaos this caused under the System Lords. Long live Egeria's memory."**

"Long live Egeria's memory." they answered in unison as the old Tok'ra rose to leave the room, considering how he could raise the Tok'ra outside the Rectangle, people he had not been in contact with for over a thousand years.

**Mess hall, Sol gate facility**

**Republic of Luna, Terran Confederation**

**January 3, 2157**

"Happy New Year!" Juan Littlefield looked up, seeing Isabella Rodriguez taking a place next to him.

"Happy New Year. How was Prometheus?"

She grinned. "It was nice to visit my parents over Christmas. Just being able to take a week off and leave Sol without spending two weeks in transit... This is simply great."

"Yes, we took a day to visit Karsa."

Her tone grew concerned "How is he?"

"We got lucky, he recovered completely. His oldest friend wasn't that lucky…" It was a shame. A case of the flu had hit Nagada like a sledgehammer once the viruses had arrived, met a local Abydonian Mastadge flu and evolved into a completely new virus, combining properties of both. Only the fact that the Health observers had immediately raised a pandemic alert and the vaccinations freely handed out beforehand had allowed them to keep the casualties at a paltry half percent of the population, those being mostly too old and weak or too young for the vaccinations to take even their reduced effect.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands were suffering on Luna and Prometheus, which had been locked down completely except for gate travel to move doctors and gear between the three infected worlds.

Trying not to think of it, Juan changed the topic. "So, how did you like the book?"

She laughed, pulling out a thick book. "I shouldn't have told you of that Jackson book. 'Mythological Panspermia – A detailed Observation of Ra in Terran and Vilani Culture'. Seriously?!"

"Hey, I thought you'd like it. Besides," he smiled mischievously "it would have ended up on your desk, anyway. I hear ARGUS marked the author as high priority source the moment they got hold of that book."

"Oh?" she looked at the book's back and read "Eneri Enleshkaadshar, born 2068 in Shurikhasar, Nusku, is the main shugilii of the Enleshkaadshar clan, a family unbroken back to the days before the fall of the Kirmashargur. He takes his readers on a fascinating journey from the Ishimaga province on Vland to Giza and the deepest chambers of Sharurshid's ancient rituals."

"That guy is nearly 90?! He looks no day older than 50."

"Yes, and not an ugly 50." She smiled "Vilani longevity is a real boon…"

"Good genes, yes." he teased her "So, he's from Nusku…"

"Apparently he moved to Giza. Ballsy move for a Lanni…"

"Well, yeah. Egypt has to be the only place in the Confederation where an Impie is just number two on the 'to kill' list." he smirked. "But, well, at least they didn't play god with their ancestors and made their proud culture a mockery over night." Of course, it also helped that Egypt had been spared the nuclear fire.

**Hathor's cell, space station Beta 47**

**Earth-Luna L4 point**

**January 4th, 2157**

Nearly half a year she had sat in that bare small chamber, eating military rations and not being allowed the slightest luxury. Weeks of isolation only broken by an hour a day she was allowed to spend in a bigger room, escorted to questioning sessions by a Tau'ri – because that was what she had heard from a conversation at a change of guards – in sealed armor both ways led to her readiness to talk. At least they didn't wear the armor because of her... not anymore, anyway. She had managed to find out that this was simply their standard gear for security duty in space, working as both armor and a vacc suit in case of a hull breach.

While this had consoled her somewhat, it had taken long for her to answer the first questions, and it had humiliated her utterly. After two weeks, she gave them the first bit of information, earning her a comb. A comb! Such s small item, and yet so much in her situation. Now, she had a mattress, a hair dryer, some printed books, better food and some other minor luxury items she would have thought nothing of before being imprisoned here. All she had had to do to get this was giving these slaves the secrets of her race, one bit at a time.

She had been forced to tell the tale of Ra taking over Humanity, and with time, their attention loosened a bit. One day, she had "allowed" a guard to get a glimpse of her naked body, slowly advancing it to the moment he took of his helmet to kiss her. Which was what she had worked towards all that time, and she used the opportunity.

Ever since then, her power had risen. And now, it was time. The International Criminal Court had ordered her to be delivered to Geneva to begin the investigation for the cases of genocide, crimes against Humanity and slavery in millions of cases.

It was ready.

The door opened, and her guards stepped in, leading her out of the cell and towards the shuttle.

**Space station Beta 47**

**Earth-Luna L4 point**

The shuttle, escorted by ten system defense boats which traded a jump drive for of weapons, armor and redundancies, sped away, taking the sanctioned course towards The Hague. All of a sudden, a galaxy class attack cruiser vectored close by, causing the shuttle to change course and dock with the behemoth before the escorts could prevent this from happening.

The warship went to full burn moments later, leaving the escorts in the dust, soon breaching the jump denial zone. Frantic calls directed at the ship achieved nothing as its jump grid lit up and it jumped.

"Get me Traffcom! This is SDB squadron ten, Sigma Escort. TCS Centaurus just took Subject Sigma aboard, broke contact jumped at L4! Dump them the Navcomp data! I repeat,"

The call reached Terra marked URGENT and an order was dispatched to the ancient tel'tac that immediately began to search for the jumpspace event corresponding to the refugees.

Thanks to the incredibly short distance and already provided navigational data, it took only a few seconds to make sure they were going to Junction, the world leading directly to the rimward corridor out of confederated space… and one without an FTL comm.

Once the cursing was finished, this caused the immediate deployment of several couriers as well as highly encoded highest priority orders to capture the ship. It did not take long to spot the life pods they had ejected before approaching the shuttle, and soon the survivors where brought aboard the escorts.

Strangely, there were only women in the pods, and they told stories about their male colleagues behaving strangely, effectively mutinying for no apparent reason.

**Enleshkaadshar suite, 58th floor**

**Apartment building between Nile and Pyramids**

**Giza, Egypt, Terra**

**January 5, 2157**

Terra was interesting. The pyramids visible from his living room, built 4,000 years after the Industrial Revolution on Vland, were considered ancient. No, he corrected himself. They were build by alien slave masters, a full millennium and a half before Vland embraced industry. It was astonishing to see those primitives – assuming the giant statues of half-naked men with spears they were now placing all around the pyramids were in the same ballpark as the truth - throw off the yoke of alien invaders, only to forget all of this for the next five millennia and seeing many, many different cultures in the meantime instead of the single one Vland had seen since his people discovered fire.

Admittedly, it had to help that Terran generations were so damn _short_, but still…

Even though the Terrans hated him, it had been easy to get this apartment. Money was stronger than hate - all he had to do was to show them his bank account. This was yet another alien concept to him, having grown up in a world where tradition demanded he buy a certain brand, a certain amount of a certain product fitting to his place in society, and anything out of the normal had to be provided by shady deals with the few subject races mentally incapable of complying with the Vilani way of life completely even after centuries of attempted reeducation. Still, it had to be hidden, if only for tradition's sake. Simply buying such a flat without an extensive introduction or at least providing basic information to enable to identify his position in greater society would have been completely unthinkable, but his broker had waved away all that, only asked for his bank account and told him he had to look rich if he wanted to do anything.

So he did it, and besides the constant reminder of going against tradition, he didn't regret it at all. After selling his holdings in the Empire, he had bought many things that could be sold easily in the Confederation, and once he had reaped the profit, he had invested it in major Terran Corporations, giving him enough disposable income to live… extravagantly. He already had bought a speeder, pre-ordered one of Kaufmann's new line of speeders based on these "Goa'uld" fighters and was intent on enjoying all the possibilities this new society offered to the fullest.

It definitely did not hurt that it was expected of all nobles to be at least partially merchant, even if Terran markets were profoundly different from Vilani ones. Frowning, he noticed he had almost called them "civilized markets", an arrogance unfitting of someone who considered himself intelligent and well-educated.

While the Confederation was different and offended his sensibilities without even trying, they were fresh. They had new ideas. Completely new ideas were still something he was not entirely fond of, but it helped to see them as traditions destroyed by the Conquerors. And he most definitely did not want to end as mentally ossified as mainstream Vilani culture, which had turned intellectual incest into an art form. This… yes, he was willing to call it _curiosity_, had helped him play the market when he arrived; and it would also grant him a few jobs with Terrans trying to invest in Nusku. Of that, he was sure.

As sure as he was of the fact that the housekeeper he had hired was a spy; any candidates had to be, so he hired the one that spoke the best Vilani, was easiest on the eye and did acceptable probationary work. It wasn't as if he was unused to the games of the powerful, after all. What he was unused to was being hated instead of revered, and so he stayed in his penthouse, gave holo interviews about Ra or the Ziru Sirka, and played the stock markets for fun when he was not studying Terran culture and customs.

**Somewhere in Peraspera's asteroid belt**

**January 5th 2157**

Located on a random asteroid in a system off the beaten track that held nothing but a colony of around ten thousand, mostly scientists working on terraforming techniques and their families, Tycho Brahe Station was the perfect location for secret government research, and as such housed most of the weapon-related Goa'uld artifacts in telepresence isolation labs extending from the main body on scaffolding arms.

Suddenly, a silent explosion in one of the arms rocked the station, followed immediately by an emergency ejection of the lab involved.

**Confederated News Network**

**January 13th 2157**

"A major explosion rocked the Tycho Brahe station and destroyed a laboratory conducting super capacitor research last week. The Ministry of War stated that this could delay the research on new, more compact weapon systems by at least a year."

The attractive news anchor pulled up another news article on her perscomp, reading it to the audience like their old counterparts would have used notes on paper. "In related news, the Sixth and Eighth Planetary Defense Field Armies have been stood down to standard readiness after the riots rising up as the Hathor process was canceled have faded out. Seventh and Ninth remain under full alertness in case this happens again. We hope this tragedy does not repeat itself."

**Ministry of Health**

**Beijing, China, Terra**

**January 07, 2157**

The people in the ministry's conference room sat around a row of holo screens linking them to the MoH branches on Luna, Prometheus and Abydos, the latter using Goa'uld long range communicators to link to the Sol gate facility and enter the LunaNet there.

"What's the status on Abydos? Did the synthesized antibodies help?" the Minister of health asked, opening the meeting.

"The mortality rate has been reduced slightly, and we managed to stabilize several critical cases. They help, but no where near enough. I have heard rumors of people claiming it's the curse of Ra, but fortunately, most people are saner than that." The representative of Abydos answered, earning relieved nods from the others.

"Our efforts to isolate and synthesize Abydonian antibodies in the Greenland Labs seem to have been partially successful. We can now synthesize the antibodies for former infections and already ordered an industrial synthesizer, but those for the new variant haven't been successfully synthesized yet." the Terran representative continued "Old-fashioned standard antivirals still help a lot, but all our analyses haven't given us the needed data yet, so we can't possibly hope to tailor a vaccine."

"We are working as fast as we can, but even if we blocked the fab for days, we would still need more and better personnel for all the supercomputers, labs and other stuff… OMOROCA II should be ready tomorrow, but that's too late to analyze the current batch." the Abydonian representative stepped in. "Today, we also we got the first shipment of several crates of various drugs, including this Ushkiirga-drug. First tests proved it to work extremely well, massively increasing the number of patients who recover. On top of that, Ushkiirga is both an anti-viral and an antibiotic, and as such deals with any opportunistic infections at the same time."

"It was delivered by the first medical bulk freighter from Nusku, but we sent you all it dropped off." Luna's representative stated "If it works that well, we need as much of it as we can get."

"As a result of this, we have dispatched a highest priority order to Nusku to provide as much of it as they can to stabilize the situation. Fabbing time limits mean we are unable to produce sufficient doses for more than a small number of the patients. I already prepared an order of vastly more fabbing time, and would need all your signatures on that " this earned nods from everyone, and soon the motion was enhanced by several biometric signatures of high ranking MoH officials.

"Meanwhile, we can finalize the adaption of our genefixes to pure Abydonians so we have something available if the Abydonians decide to accept them…"

"You're going to let them reintroduce genetic diseases into the genepool?"

"This is a purely internal matter of the Commonwealth, and it is their decision if they want genetherapy or not. The Confederated Healthcare Plan, on the other hand, is dependent on the fix as a matter of law, and we will not change that law for offspring of mixed heritage, be it Abydonian, Nuskuan or anything. We're at war. We simply can't afford to pay for a sickness a simple procedure would have prevented before the patient was even born. And if that results in a family or two moving to Nagada, that's okay by me. They need all the manpower with good education that they can get to keep the Naquadah mines operable, after all." after everyone else silently acknowledged this the Minister of Health ended the meeting. "Gentlemen, keep me informed about the flu problem. If you will excuse me please, I have a meeting with the committee for Goa'uld prevention techniques, and then I'll talk to the Secretary-General about fabbing time allotments again."

**Pel'tak, Ha'tak Chu'alahk**

**A few light years from Abydos**

**January 07, 2157**

Jer'get's nervousness had only increased since the enchanter priest had called him. Somehow the natives had outsmarted Bahlon, and he was glad that he hadn't participated in calling Abydos, simply blissfully doing his captain's duty in keeping his crew in shape instead.

Morale on the Chu'alahk was low. Contact to their god had been lost and they were half a year into the Death Rectangle now. Fortunately, his ship hadn't exploded yet, but doubt began to creep in, wasn't this where – at least according to old legends whispered at the threat of repeated death penalty - Ra had lost a full world? Tau'ra even? He had always fought the blasphemers telling these stories, but now, deep in the Rectangle, he suddenly wasn't so sure anymore. There were even contacts spotted by the observers, only to disappear without a trace a moment later. Was it a cloaked enemy? His ship's magic malfunctioning? Overworked, frightened Jaffa seeing ghosts?

But there was worse news – All over the galaxy, Asgard ships had been sighted, and all protected worlds were watched by small fleets strong enough to wipe out a minor underlord's fleet in a minute. Apparently, the protected planets had been unprotected for millennia, and yet no sign of the System Lords reacting had ever reached Bahlon, which was normally kept in the loop enough know about things like this. This was another hit to their collective ego, only reinforced by Asgard ships roaming the galaxy at will.

"Master! Sensors are picking up farspeaker traffic to spinward! We have identified at least three sources there, and one at Abydos! Master… the ship says Tau'ra is amongst them."

Jer'get's head snapped around. Farspeaker traffic meant developed civilization – at least developed enough to steal Ra's farspeakers, distribute and use them -, and if this included Tau'ra... "Could they be a problem?"

"Probably, I can identify several sources spread over several light years."

"I think we found out what happened to Ra… Move us to the strongest signal source. And give me Bahlon so we can inform the Enchanters."

**Galar – report to the Asgard High Council**

**Three weeks post contact**

**By Hrist**

While Galar is still only taking the first baby steps towards their own FTL drive, a technology unknown to us but relying on the same theoretical basis as the Avalon drives Councilor Penegal encountered in Ra's domain, they are still far more advanced than the System Lords would ever have tolerated.

The fact they already colonized several moons in the gas giant system Galar is located in, their asteroid belt and smaller worlds in their solar system is a dead giveaway, as is the fact that the colonies further away had already considered independence, even causing the Galaran government to create its own Space Force, involving their warrior orders in the process, although it consisted of only a few police vessels to watch their belt.

The Galar task force's sudden appearance in front of a police cutter, a ship much smaller than even a Valkyrie's main weapon system, tripped several dozen visual system survey sensor suites and raised alert levels all over the system.

Thankfully, no one was insane enough to fire at the task force, although it appeared to be close as they suddenly appeared out of nowhere in Galaran orbit. New scan protocols have been established, as a delay of only one split second would have meant a crash into an orbital habitat, killing thousands.

Still, this is not the only reason why our position in regards to the Galarans could be better. Once the original shock of aliens arriving in the Galaran system had settled down a bit, Councilor Penegal initiated talks with Galar.

Unfortunately, this leaves both of us in a dilemma concerning the Protected Planets Treaty's wording and spirit. Furthermore, it has started a spike in arms and propulsion tech development all over the system, further fueled by knowledge about the Stargate's existence and function, the existence of other Humans, the Goa'uld and the feasibility of many technologies only known from fiction before.

The main cause for this is Asgard credibility. To be precise, it is our lack thereof.

The Galarans were less than enthused to learn of the treaty once they got access to the full text. They also interpreted it in ways we never considered, but probably are inevitable in hindsight.

No one assumes the Asgard would stay forever, as we had not been seen for millennia, and we freely admitted to having been somewhere else, after all.

While "being too busy to care" is harsh criticism, the death blow to Asgard credibility is the part of the treaty concerning Humanity's status and tech limitations. Even the Ettin Slayers, an order of warrior priests otherwise strictly supporting Penegal after his return, do see this as... problematic. Still, the order renewed its offer of help, technological support and protection to both K'Tau and the people that got attacked by the K'Tau slave masters on their homeworld. It is also being consulted in the new Galaran gate program's early stages.

Within days, support to independence movements crumpled as the government fulfilled most colonial demands and a strong Galaran nation was now more and more seen as a layer of defense against the System Lords. Now, independence from the Goa'uld, and striking out into the galaxy through the gate became main priorities. The Councilor's speech to the Galaran government after he dialed in from Meeting Point Midgard was especially helpful, as he accompanied a robot through the gate before the highest government officials followed onto an unsettled world rich in resources and ripe for colonization.

Basically, Galar is only a local problem, although potentially able to grant us access to a few new technologies. The Avalon drive system and their memory extraction/implantation and implant technologies for Human brains might prove interesting.

It is definitely less important than other problems encountered in Avalon, namely cleaning up Svoriin, healing K'Tau or protected worlds having been meddled with by rogue Asgard, and it pales in comparison to the regular chroniton spikes detected in the Nukta spiral arm.

I recommend the High Council keep an eye on the situation.

For further details, see attached reports.

Signed

Hrist.

**A/N: **After I had someone claim he wanted to defend the Asgard once I presented the sentiment about them I used in here, let me say this: I like the Asgard. They're great, and I had to change a lot to even include them.

That said, seen from Humans under their "protection", they're all hat and no cattle. They're not even in the damn galaxy, and while the replicator war is a reasonable reason... try to think Galaran. Tomorrow, some guys we never heard of (except in religion, perhaps) come back and declare they protect us from that bunch of villains, but we have to go back to pre-industrial tech so their protection would be valid under some treaty we never heard of.

I'm pretty sure most of us would tell them where to stick it if they weren't able to erase cities from orbit.

The Oannes see it similarly. They're fighting for millennia, and these little gray guys sign a treaty that only someone brainwashed by Asgard propaganda can interpret as protecting Humans from the System Lords (It includes accepting that Humans are Goa'uld slaves, after all.) and then don't even act on it.

It doesn't help that they have no clue of the Replicators.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter six**

**Unnamed system, ****Milky Way Rim**

**January 1st, 2157**

Gripping the command stone to order himself a drink, Nerot suddenly registered the base computer becoming unresponsive. Just as he wanted to complain to the base's mind, the seal of the Asgard Union appeared in every screen in his field of vision and the computer voice stepped in.

"Emergency override. Emergency beacon detected." One of the screens changed, showing a picture of the local group, then switching to a video feed.

"Burn them all! Give me Ida!"

**Bridge, Sleipnir**

**Milky Way Rim**

**January 10th, 2157**

Penegal was intrigued. By coincidence, his trip had led him into a galactic region teeming with life. The ship he had shadowed had come out in a lifeless system shortly thereafter, only to refuel at a gas giant and do another small, slow hyperspace hop. Now, once he knew what to look for and he had produced and installed a science array, his scanners had clearly shown webs of these bubbles crossing a remarkable volume of space that, according to his files, belonged to Ra.

His analysis had identified at least six separate networks, most of them expanding, but there were also smaller groups of signatures extending coreward on a straight line.

Spending several days in interstellar space, he had listened to a lot of radio chatter barely discernible from the background after being in transit for years, his computers effortlessly chewing through their encryption while he had had to partake in several Council sessions concerning most of the Treaty worlds. He had been intrigued to learn that Galar, the world where he had appeared as a patron deity so long ago, was busy colonizing their home system while Thor's Cimmeria was still considering forged steel the greatest invention ever. It also amused him to no end that his religion had spawned an order of technologically advanced warrior-priests while Thor's, formed by their commander in chief after all, had done no such thing.

Deciphering the local protocols, however, took longer than just decrypting, and their language… there seemed to be at least two languages, like the System Lords used High and Low Goa'uld.

Curiously, one of the two did not even use sound at all, being reduced to a script, while he had identified at least four (more probably several dozen) different species using it, one of them clearly Human. There was yet another species of a body plan like none of the four races, using only the non-verbal communication. Apparently, they were mute.

This was… _fascinating_. A new multi-species polity using an altogether different tech base incorporating such diverse and truly alien creatures without any hint of governmental structure was not something seen in millennia. And while their tech base was not exactly very impressive, it _was_ higher than any System Lord would tolerate… especially seeing how their closest neighbor got some tech closer, if only marginally, to the intergalactic standard. This was even more fascinating.

There were constant skirmishes between members of a single race that was part of this polity while it also got its own, independent, interstellar state. Still, he had picked up several cases of those people changing citizenship between the fighting states without anyone caring. And while they fought on the polity's spinward border without many worlds changing owners, the other state easily expanded on its own spinward border.

And the Goa'uld kept clear of it, even if it was actually Ra's territory. Considering what had nearly happened to his ship, Penegal could definitely see why.

"Computer, set course to watch gri…"

"I am receiving a transmission from High Command, Councilor. All ships in this galaxy not assigned to enforcing the Protected Planets Treaty or participating in Operation Nukta are to assemble at meeting point Midgard at maximum speed."

"We have to leave the galaxy? Does it state a reason?"

"No, I'm afraid not. And before you ask: It's a Valkyrie-class alert issued by Supreme Commander Thor. The most fascinating science, even under a councilor's oversight, is not enough to question or delay it."

Sighing, Penegal nodded. "Right. Deploy cloaked spy sats and engage drives."

"Understood."

A moment later, the hyperspace vortex opened, swallowing the Sleipnir as its intergalactic drives kicked in while the cloaked spy sats began to distribute themselves over local space and scan scanning the area where he has been located, with another one taking course to Tau'ra .

**Gate area**

**MP3X-403**

**January 11, 2157**

A probe left the gate, slowly rising into the sky and sending the data back to Luna. There were no radio waves, no neutrino emissions, no signs of any high technology whatsoever, so it started the preset search pattern.

It took only minutes to find the deserted mine, and another astonishing find: A clearing on a forested hill overlooking a valley held many staff weapons, stun snakes and Jaffa helmets on some kind of altar, with a fireplace that was still emitting heat from a fire burning here mere hours ago. Yet there were no houses, or even just huts or fields to be seen anywhere.

The only signs of habitation beside the altar were several scarecrows holding up skeletons, still wearing Jaffa armor, facing all entries to the clearing.

After recording the clearing from several angles, the probe rose higher and continued scouting the rest of the mountain range.

**Meeting room, Sol gate facility**

**January 12, 2157**

"The finds on 403 are truly fascinating." Dr. Rodriguez presented what she had managed to learn from the data sent through the gate after eight hours of operation on MP3X-403. "There are signs of earlier habitation, such as a well overgrown path connecting the gate to an area where we can find the sites of old buildings in the soil. But these are thousands of years old, and far from the most interesting find."

The next picture was an altar full of Goa'uld paraphernalia. "While this could be interpreted as a sign of worship, I'm pretty sure it is not, as these pictures leave very little doubt."

And they did not. Several dead Jaffa ceremonially displayed on scarecrow-like scaffolds built from horns, clearly acting as a warning could be seen on the pictures. They still wore their full armor, even if the helmet was folded in, pierced by silvery arrows easily a meter long.

"Okay, now THAT is a 'stay the fuck away', sign everyone can read…" Ferretti slowly whistled. "So it's more like they put all their loot there to scare off the Jaffa. While I don't think they would care, it takes balls of Trinium to do that."

Middleton snorted. "Hell, I'd probably piss myself if I saw such an arrow come flying towards the Carrier's front shield…" He looked in the round "What? Do you seriously think it's as good as a ship hull?"

"Sam has a point." Isabella nodded, pulling up a new picture that showed several reptilian looking Humanoids clad in hides, furs and bone necklaces. They held spears with stone heads or shredded pieces of Jaffa armor as heads, or axes using other armor pieces, but two of them carried silvery bows nearly as tall as the archers. Changing to a video, it showed how the probe silently followed them in the skies. They obviously were born hunters, and soon were seen battling a massive beast in an clearing, the melee fighters not backing down even after hits that would have broken Human bones effortlessly while the archers took careful aim.

Soon, the animal was dead, killed by liberal application of meter long trinium arrows from short range, and brought into a cave complex, while the probe recorded their language, which included quite a lot of hisses and growls.

"Okay, now that is remarkable. Do I see another Ra rebellion here?"

"It nearly looks like it, but if you look back to the hunt," she switched to a screenshot "it does not fit. This animal is trilateral, as are all others we have seen on the captured pictures. On all planets known to us, there is only a small number of body plans in existence at the same time. Terra has mammals, birds and reptiles with four limbs, insects with six and arachnoids with eight – but all of them are bilateral. If these people evolved there, it would be the first world with drastically different body plans in otherwise closely related looking species – and with that, I mean 'whale to Human' closely related – we know of. It's not as if they seem to be starfishes. Therefore, my conclusion as of this moment is another one. It was a slave rebellion on a rather unimportant world, because if what the Oannes told us is true, no Goa'uld would care about those little scarecrows if there was something really important to get. No, the gate, the road to these hills and the ancient building complex tell me they had been sent here, rebelled, killed off a few follow-up waves of Jaffa trying to get the world back, and then decided to scrub it as it wasn't worth the effort. The latter waves probably fell to those bows."

Nodding, General Li sighed. At least these were real aliens, not just another bunch of cavemen he had to take in because the Confederation did not want Humans to regress to that level. Thankfully, Abydos had agreed to take in the people of Avnil, as their native technological base was something the Avnilians could at least understand, and the vaccinations developed after the first flu had ensured there were survivors. "In that case, you should go have a look what actually happened there and if you can establish contact with the natives."

"Yes, Sir. But that is not all we found." The picture of a valley appeared, and it was clear at once that this valley was inhabited as a wooden bridge spanned a broad river flowing from a waterfall, through the valley and into a lake were it met another river just below another, smaller, waterfall. There were also terraces with fields, orchards, meadows and streets, but no signs of houses.

Then the picture changed, showing houses carved into the stone a few hundred meters before the forest began, caves enlarged into proper dwellings, a big cliff filled with what looked like writing and small aqueducts where water was taken from the waterfall and used to irrigate the fields.

"Wow."

"This impressive display of masonry is located a hundred kilometers away from the gate. The river starting from that lake flows west, away from the gate, but it is connected to the gate area by being located in the same mountain chain. I estimate that their agriculture can easily support thousands, and we don't know what's inside these cave systems or if they go hunting in the forests or trade with the hunters we saw, but we do know that they are able to fish. They could easily feed at least low tens of thousands." The picture switched, showing a close up to the broad waterfall where the river left the valley - large parts of it blocked by nets and fish traps, and spanned by a rope bridge close above the water allowing the locals to empty them, with a road connecting it to a small harbor full of small rowed boats and places for two bigger ones. "Going by the data we have collected, these people are in the middle of what I can only call the Trinium age."

**Ember, 2227 Sol Subsector, Terran Confederation**

**January 13th, 2157**

The peace was over. It had been months since the first convoy to Abydos had passed through, and Ember had been woken from its long sleep. Smaller than Luna, and with nearly no atmosphere, it had originally been intended as a stepping-stone into space to trailing. But as no one found a way to step past the rift for years, the funding to look for one disappeared and so did any plans to build on Ember.

Until now. Where only a year ago only a single small city had stood on a mountain of never-thawing water ice, supporting the few miners, prospectors and explorers trying to make a living on the chemicals people could extract when a solar flare thawed the planet, the single city was now growing rapidly. The same was true for the starport which now had to deal with orders of magnitude more traffic than it had handled up to now.

Not everyone liked this development. While not long ago Ember enjoyed a frontier feeling, now however the sky was constantly patrolled by the Navy, which had quickly eliminated the Wild West way in which things had been handled before the its arrival..

One person in particular had a real problem with this development. Setekh Golan, better known as Seth, had fled Tau'ra as soon as he learned that the planet was being combed for Goa'uld and their artifacts. Two months ago, they had even stormed his former home.

Fortunately, he had fled before this happened, and now had to hide in this hellhole. The only good thing about this was that the locals were advanced, if not exactly trusting in authority, and so it had been easy to acquire new looks for him and his followers after taking over this shady, but good doctor with his Nish'ta. And other methods of influence - apparently, they had captured Hathor, making Nish'ta something they could know about. In the meanwhile, all the Confederation had been flooded with wanted posters showing his old host while all public buildings had been equipped with Naquada detectors.

Additionally, even on this distant world, everyone knew to look for hidden Goa'uld, and, except for members of his cult, wanted to kill any they found – another thing he had to fear.

Before the Tau'ri had found the path to Abydos, this world held less than three thousand inhabitants, a number that had now increased tenfold, even as many explorers collected their equipment and headed to trailing. Many of the independent miners were being replaced by mining corporations now offering them jobs or sending in their own people operating from orbital installations.

Ember was changing, and it showed that the Tau'ri had developed into a major problem. Apparently, their intelligence services already had a new lead towards him – a population hating his guts more than they hated the state they lived under was a real problem.

Yes, most of them thought of it as a police state and had fled to its rim to be free. Still, however oppressive it might feel to live under a Human government fighting for its survival, it was vastly better than the Conditions Ra forced the Abdonians to live under. The Abydonians had made this abundantly clear, and no one in the Confederation would ever forgive a Goa'uld without Nish'ta.

Or one they captured, like Hathor. He was curious to see when she managed to escape… An option he probably no longer had.

Apparently, he hadn't been thorough enough when changing his symbols. Who would have thought there had been enough of that old cult left over for someone to find a symbol he hadn't used in four millennia and identify it on a package to Ember...

And now, he was sitting on a planet of strategic importance, with the Tau'ri intelligence already following him. No, he would not allow himself to be captured. He would not become a test subject.

He had lived on Earth for nearly ten thousand years, had seen them growing from squabbling tribes to a world state reaching for the stars. And in all that time, there had been war, war driving their development until they had grown into something no sane System Lord would ever have allowed to develop. Nearly two centuries ago, they had reached the level of what he expected an enchanter world under Ra's rule to be like outside of the priest districts. Seventy years ago, they had surpassed it, even if they were still significantly below the level of the throne and priest districts

Their ships – even with help from the other feral state, the so called "Great Empire of Stars" – were laughably primitive. But their Navy knew how to fight, had been in a fierce battle for survival for more than forty years. They still weren't as good as their ground troops, battle-hardened soldiers drawing from millennia of all-out warfare that would wipe the floor with even the best warriors and would give even an enchanter formation problems, but they knew how to fight out-teched and out-gunned.

He knew Terra, and because of this, he was afraid. No, he would not allow himself to be captured alive.

In his house in the middle of Ember city, the outskirts of the pre-expansion city, Seth took out a small piece of potassium and a bit of Naquada one of his followers had been able to acquire at a black market.

Moments later, a small mushroom cloud rose, rapidly dissolving and only leaving radiation once it had consumed the air inside the domed city and expanded into the nearly non-existent atmosphere, taking with it the remains of old Ember, including the water ice plateau it had been built on.

**Gate area**

**MP3X-403**

**January 14, 2157**

As the gate finished dialing, the massive shapes of two grav tanks floated through, taking position next to it and allowing the two G-Carriers and the Rocs to enter this new world.

Today, there was an addition, though. An extra carrier floated through, holding a team of diplomats. The Abydonian Commonwealth had caused considerable problems – while the Confederation had possessed diplomats before, they had only known two kinds of sovereign entities: Confederated member states and worlds, which were not foreign and therefore did not need ambassadors, and the Ziru Sirka, which normally was dealt with by the Ministry of War and negotiators only familiar with talking to an enemy.

Last year's session of the General Assembly had been dominated by debates about the formation of a proper Foreign Office, its staff and location. Finally, the offworld members, in concert with the poorer nations on Terra and the capital of providing two out of the three gates in Terran possession, as well as the materials and shipyards needed to survive the wars, had won the first Ministry not on Terra. Located in Prometheus' capital city of Nova Europa, linked to Terra by subspace comm and staffed by personnel of mostly colonial or African origin, it was a signal that the old order could no longer be taken for granted.

For now, there were no trained personnel ready to deal with aliens, and the first contact protocols had been unnecessary for over 40 years, so the diplomats were provided by Egypt, the Ministry of War and the Colonial Bureau, with universities sending a stream of advisers to the new ministry from every conceivable and inconceivable faculty the government felt could be useful.

Before the carriers came through the gate, several survey probes and comm. relays able to stay airborne practically forever using solar cells and a contragrav system were fired through by the anti-ship missile racks that were part of the gate room defenses.

One of the probes immediately rose into the sky and flew towards the village, ready to provide all the data they needed to make their way towards first contact.

Back in the carrier, Isabella checked her perscomp again, making sure the translator programs were ready. Not that there was any chance for them to already include the alien's language, but it made her feel better, and so she continued to run diagnosis programs.

"Contact team, we can only use the Carrier to Waypoint Charlie. Stay in the suits until at least Delta, even if the air reads clear. " Juan said into his helmet's communicator before entering again and enabling the two carriers to begin their journey through the woods.

**An hour later**

"Major" Sam Middleton spoke on the command channel "You better have a look at this." With these words, an icon appeared in his visor, which, when activated displayed in his visor vidfeeds from the probe.

A fire was burning before the altar, and a group of the aliens sat there, talking. The woods around this scene were full of warriors, but they did not look as if they were doing anything but guard these talks while several small armed groups roamed the surroundings, one of the warriors shooting a large animal as he watched them. Regardless of how poorly they were equipped, each of them wore something around his neck – a thick bone necklace, leather protectors or even trinium chainmail obviously scavenged from Jaffa armor.

Then his focus went back to the fire. Six big, scarred aliens, obviously equipped far better than their guards, were sitting there, talking. "The records are fed to the first contact team and Isabella?"

"Of course, sir."

Next to each of the aliens was a piece of cloth bearing various goods – furs, meat, hides, trophies or even ore. "Can you get me readings on that?"

"Yes, sir. Running it against the database. It's… Naquadah and Trinium ore! This trip just got quite a bit better…"

As he said that, a new group of aliens appeared out of the woods. Where the ones already there had only equipment that looked scavenged and worn, the newcomers wore leather boots and trousers combined with heavy-looking armor made from Trinium scales. All but one of them carried an axe, a bow with a quiver full of arm-long arrows and a dark, wooden shield mounted to the lower arm.

One of them stood out; it wore white, toga-like clothes with broad yellow stripes and red markings clinched by a wide belt. The horns and ridges on its head were dyed a deep black with shiny stones set in them, and its neck was protected by what looked like reinforced chainmail with more shiny stones set in it.

The six aliens rose, and exchanged greetings before the first of the hooded aliens joined the other guards.

Out of the ten newcomers, only three were still there. One of them was the ornately clad one, while the other two wore rucksacks and carried between them a wooden box with Trinium inlays.

With what could be interpreted as a smile, the alien in the fancy clothes took a trinium knife out of his belt, offering it to an alien clad in scavenged Jaffa armor. Bowing deeply, it accepted, giving a small pile of furs in return. This exchange of gifts continued until everyone had been traded with, then they all settled down to talk.

This time though, it looked as if everyone expected was there, and so it was more dynamic than what they had seen before.

"Major, I want to go out there."

"Do you think this is a good time to do it, Mr. Secretary?"

"Yes. This looks like a conference between pre-nation states. I think this is a good time to introduce ourselves."

"Okay, you get two guards with you. Intel tells me these bows they carry can probably pierce our suits, so don't rely on technical superiority."

"Major, I plan to rely on something completely different. As you have seen, these talks began by an exchange of gifts. So we will bring gifts."

"That… sounds practicable. What do you intend to gift them?"

"We have a pack of lighters and flashlights each, and I think that should suffice." he said with a confident tone.

"Okay, I have to admit, that sounds like a plan." He switched channels "Ferretti, Buntap, you're with the contact team. This will begin with an exchange of gifts, so we don't expect trouble. Still, be on guard."

"Understood." The two acknowledged, jumping out of their respective Carrier before helping Isabella and the three diplomats out of the carriers.

"Thanks Sergeant." Secretary Williamson smiled "But unnecessary. I served my stint in the second war – even if we always had grav support back then. A shame you still have to walk yourself, right?."

"Right. Now stop talking and yomp. You have seen the OpFor, act accordingly." Ferretti grinned, by now helping the Egyptian secretary out of the carrier.

"Yomp? Damn gropo slang…" the secretary muttered, shaking his head while he went to the side and grabbed a gravpack.

After a twenty minute walk, the six approached the alien perimeter. Suddenly, an alien voice yelled "SHESH!", resulting in five archers, four of them clad in leather and one in trinium scale, to appear in the woods.

The one clad in scale yelled to the Humans. "KEL?!"

Stepping forward, Williamson slowly showed them a flashlight, activating it and pointing the light a bit around, earning him impressed looks. Then he switched it off, placed it on the ground, stepping back and signaling them to take it.

"Cho'ee'che?" the apparent leader pointed to the light, then between him and the Humans "Te ka cho'ee'che?"

"Choe eee' chey." Williamson nodded, earning a puzzled look, and then an almost Human shrug.

"Cho'ee'che. Ka cha Ka nayO." Was the answer, followed by the scale clad alien pointing in the direction of the clearing. "Ka cha."

"I… think he's telling us to go there." Williamson gulped, then followed the guard towards the fire the talks were held. As the rest of the team followed, they were well guarded by extremely attentive archers.

Their arrival at the fire drew a lot of attention, and not all of it was positive. While the first arrivals only looked interested, the newcomer was downright agitated, talking fast and sharply to the others.

While he did so, Williamson presented the flashlight again, trying again to pronounce the strange word he had learned.

As he did so, the alien in the Jaffa armor rose, came over, took a deep look into his eyes, and then turned around. "Choe'ee'che. Kor Asek tarek Choe'ee'che."

"Benna!" he turned to Williamson again, pointing to the ground. "Konaj'jo tarek onac keka." He underlined the words with gestures. Having read of many strange greeting practices after studying every first contact he could find, Williamson slowly knelt down, signaling the others to do the same while fearing what would happen if they didn't .

The big alien smiled contentedly, took the flashlight and handed back a trinium bracelet with attractive stones from his left arm. Then, he placed his clawed hand on Williamson's hand, holding him in place for the other he had identified as Konaj'jo to come closer and place his claws on Williamson's head.

After a short while, Konaj'jo nodded. "Ka onac. Tarek ka onac. Cho'ee'che." Going back to the fire, he took another trinium knife, offering it to a secretary that was utterly relieved his gamble had paid off, as his normal negotiation partners looked far more civilized.

Then, Williamson gave gifts to the others at the fire, collecting quite a few things he probably would never need again, and finally, the talks could be started.

**Eight hours later**

Returning from the meeting around the now dying fire, secretary Williamson opened a comm. channel to the carrier. "This is Secretary Williamson. As far as I can tell right now, these talks are a success. Still, the locals are used to diplomatic talks, and have no problem of talking for days. They call themselves the Ujatklun, and this was an annual meeting between the six most powerful clans and the town we saw; its name is Konaj'jo. We are allowed to enter clan and town territory, but are expected to bring gifts. In return… well, I acquired several furs and hides, a strange animal skull, a trinium bracelet and a trinium knife. Far more important, we are not at war with any of them, and the messenger from Konaj'jo invited us to his – all the negotiators were male – city to see the history of his people."

"Sounds great, Mr. Secretary. I'm curious… how do they call the planet?" Juan asked.

"Yes, I asked the same… They call it Tok, which means 'struggle'."

"Well, that's something you don't hear every day. Well, this isn't exactly a public park."

**Conference room**

**Sol Gate Facility Quarantine Area, Luna**

**January 16, 2157**

"So we left the cave system after passing a few checkpoints with defenses obviously destined to keep wild animals or the clans out. As we stepped into the open, we faced an actual city wall built into a small ravine five meters or so below the ridge, perhaps twenty wide and a hundred long. I counted half a dozen towers to keep unwanted visitors inside the cave and plenty opportunity to stall any attacks in the tunnels with those bows of theirs." Major Littlefield continued to tell what they had seen in Konaj'jo, with helmet cam pictures appearing in the air between them. "It was impressive. The two warriors guiding us lead us through the gate – that thing looked as if you could spend hours with a battering ram and still fail to break through. And, assuming you managed that, you'd only stand before a twin of it, ten meters deeper into the ravine with battlements full of archers on both your sides. These defenses are a veritable death trap for any infantry assault. Anyway, as we finally left that wall behind, we could overlook the valley."

The picture floating in the middle switched from showing the gate to a scenic view obviously filmed from a helmet cam. In the foreground, there was a balustrade, and the far side of the valley was filled by terraces and houses. In the middle of the valley, primitive boats next to a wooden bridge served as ferries or places to fish from. As the helmet's wearer moved, they got a clear view on the mountainside they were standing on.

Isabella took over "We were lead down a slope between agricultural terraces, where many Ujatklun clad in leather and cloth with broad hats like you'd expect from a stereotypical old Chinese rice farmer picture worked in the fields, and we were glad to have the warriors with us as it apparently calmed them down to know us strangers guarded. They used trinium tools for just about everything you'd expect them to use iron or steel. The buildings were all made from stone, some of them actually carved into the mountain as we later learned. But this wasn't what impressed us the most." she switched the picture again.

On the opposite side of the valley, far from where it opened onto the lake, a vertical wall was filled by big red symbols they now knew where letters, and the camera zoomed in, showing wooden scaffolding that held Ujatklun clad like Konaj'jo's negotiator cover this wall.

Zooming in further, there were several Ujatklun carving new letters into the stone, while others dyed them red.

"This is where they tell the history of their people, their most holy place outside of the old mines. But right then, we weren't allowed to go there yet."

"Yes." Williamson took over "They lead us straight to their palace."

The picture now showed an ornate structure built into the cliff before changing to a large room lit by torches mounted on stalagmites and columns which also looked like stalagmites. Under each torch, an armed Ujatklun stood, seemingly part of some sort of guard.

At the far end of the room, a throne carved out of the cave's wall held an Ujatklun in a colorful toga, wearing heavy trinium trappings with polished stones and holding a heavy axe in his hand. His face, was also heavily dyed and adorned. Still, his eyes were the most noticeable thing about him, and even the picture made it seem as if this obvious chieftain or king was looking straight into the observer's soul.

Behind the throne stood half a dozen Ujatklun clad like the one they had met at the clearing, but with more dye and stones, which by now where easily recognizable as status symbols, in their face. They stood in front of shelves with scrolls, four of them holding halberds, the other two standing behind lecterns, their empty hands visibly placed onto them.

"As soon as we entered, our guides prostrated themselves before the Ujatklun on the throne, only rising as he made a short gesture with his axe. Ukan, the higher ranked of the two, then introduced us, which was noted down by the guys at the lecterns. Finally, their leader looked straight at me, making a gesture I interpreted as requesting me to speak. And as such, I tried to greet him. We talked with hands and feet, but were able to understand each other. As the night neared, we were invited to a royal meal."

The picture, apparently taken from a helmet placed on a piece of furniture somewhere in the room, now switched to a vidfeed, showing the contact team sitting around a big wooden table. The table was covered by exotic food, ranging from what looked like twenty centimeter long, thick, stuffed tentacles over large caviar and strange fruit to a lot of fish and diverse drinks.

At one end of the table, one of the local scribes recited a long series of verses in the harsh sounding local language.

"We had no idea what they said, but the data this provided us will dramatically help to improve the translation matrix." LeClerc threw in.

Facing the reciting scribe, the chieftain stood up when the scribe finished, bowed towards a big plateful of food at an empty seat, touching his heavy trinium neckguard. The new-found silence was only broken when he spoke. It was only a few quiet words but seemed to convey a sense of respect.

In response, all of the locals raised their drinking horns, saying another short sentence, which the Terrans tried to repeat, earning them a few respectful nods. The moment the ceremony was over, the Ujatklun started to eat and drink again.

"We later learned that this food is a sacrifice to the ancestors every household gives daily, and it is later given to the crippled and other people in need." Isabella stepped in.

"These neckguards are another interesting custom. Everyone has them, and when I first took of my helmet in the valley..."

**Konaj'jo Palace dining hall**

**January 15, 2157**

"Ah, it's about time we got rid of those helmets. I want to smell this planet's air unfiltered!" Williamson stated happily.

"In an ancient city expy? You sure about that" Littlefield grinned, earning him a disgruntled look from the Ambassador. "Point."

They all took off the helmets, placing them on a cupboard with cameras and microphones running and took their seats. A servant came close, offering a tankard with some kind of beer, suddenly jumping away, spilling most of it and yelling something. Whatever it was, it caused everyone in the room to draw weapons at the Terrans while kids, women and servants fled the room.

**Luna**

**January 16, 2157**

"It took us a while to clear the situation, but now we know that we do have to wear neckguards should we ever visit them again. Apparently, this is their best defense against getting taken over by a Goa'uld, and anyone caught without one is suspected to be taken over. As there are no Goa'uld on Tok, most Ujatklun only wear it by tradition, something you do not take off unless to show your utmost respect... or in the bedroom." Isabella went red while adding that. "Still, outside of... special circumstances..., showing up somewhere without wearing a neckguard in the first place is considered extremely rude at the very least. Doing so in the king's presence triggered all their constitutional paranoia as the royal guard is the only institution that still remembers the neckguard's true purpose."

**Command center, Fortress world,**

**Somewhere deep in Ra's domain**

**January 18th, 2157**

"Bahlon just informed us that the Ha'tak deployed to pick up Ra has detected subspace traffic originating from Abydos, Tau'ra and two other sources. I ordered them to investigate Tau'ra"

Silence reigned in the command center before the officer continued "If this information falls into the hands of the minor gods, our domain will face... tests of faith and strength. I therefore initiate LOCKDOWN status to gate operations and the Death Rectangle as well as SIEGE to the defense fleets. First priority is to bring Dakara to full readiness and upgrade its defenses immediately. Servants of Ra, we have to prepare for scavengers trying to ravage his holy worlds!"

"Supreme Prime?" a symbol at his HUD reported this voice belonged to the master of building.

"Yes, Builder Prime?"

"Ra's technology has been distributed to nearly all the minor gods in the last millennia, and we are pretty sure that most of them installed it as is, with the notable exceptions of Ba'al, Heru'ur, Apophis and the leftovers from Yu's fleets. If we deploy OBELISK now, we can be pretty sure to keep at least Sokar, Cronus and the minor system lords out of his domain."

"Thanks for bringing this to my attention, Builder Prime." He nodded and addressed his subordinates again. "Also, OBELISK is go."

In orbit around the planet, powerful antennae were activated, sending a message recorded millennia ago out into the void. The message was picked up and repeated by relays originating from a design by Ra all over the galaxy, finally reaching the Ha'tak fleets of other System Lords.

Those belonging the more careful masters that actually bothered to check what technology they installed (and could afford to do so) mostly dismissed the order, but the fleets of many minor Goa'uld and a few System Lords obediently acknowledged the command.

On a few ships, the signal was picked up, identified as hostile and triggered an alert. One place even had an unmodified old computer connected to a subspace comm. watched by enchanters that had long ago found that keeping an unchanged unit and watching what the backdoors actually did was better than simply removing them.

**Pyramid, MP3S-114**

**Ba'al's domain**

**January 20, 2157**

Zarin looked over the data the cloaked tel'tacs she had sent to trailing had provided. She hoped to find something worthwhile – it was hard to be a good spy when you controlled a slave world, but another century or two would allow her to at least move to an armor world. These were the lowest of the fortress worlds, but were allowed enough technology to feed hundreds of thousands and equip the mighty armies of the system Lords. A Goa'uld reigning one of these had impressed his master enough to be noticed and promoted above the ranks, but still far below those that ruled the higher classes of fortress worlds.

Only two Tok'ra in the whole galaxy had managed to rule one of those, and they were the most important sources of information for their 'masters', even if getting information offworld from a high fortress unnoticed was a thousandfold more difficult than doing it from a slave world.

Sighing, she put the pad away. Nothing.

Then, her communicator beeped.

"**Yes?"**

Ba'al's head appeared, and she immediately bowed deeply. **"Zarin. I ****have just been**** informed that Ra is missing."**

Her thoughts whirled. If that was true, it would change everything.

"**Reroute the scout tel'tac to the Rectangle and other parts of his domain and tell me of his defenses. We will use Moloc's remains, except for the ships, the idiot apparently didn't care to look for Ra's backdoors in his navigation system."**

"**Yes, Master. I will do so immediately."** as the channel died, she rose, slowly. Yes, this was an opportunity – for her and the Tok'ra as well as for her Master. Moloc had slaughtered all Jaffa girls born for over one and a half centuries before Ba'al finally had enough control of his rebelling priestesses and their warrior women to overthrow him, who was by then known as the god of idiocy. Of course, their treachery had been punished by death, but Ba'al now controlled his fortress worlds and what little was left of his ships and armies.

And now, apparently Ra, except for Sokar the last of the old guard and owner of all the Rectangle, had struck by backdoors in the navigation systems he had so "graciously" supplied to the other Goa'uld, crippling the navies of those that did not check his gifts with a single, swift strike from the grave. Yes, Moloc obviously got his title for more than one reason.

One of his fortresses was even close to the Death Rectangle, a region barely defended against intruders from outside of the Rectangle except by fear and a vast sensor network under control of the closest System Lords, which was reason enough to stay clear of those regions for most of the System Lords. This was even true after the responsibility for monitoring most of the defense network had been transferred to the Jaffa of minor and fallen 'gods' conquered by the System Lord holding the border, with their forces mixed together to prevent even the slightest chance of rebellion, with Enchanters preaching about their duty to protect the galaxy from the horrors living in the Rectangle. There were no ships. There were no rings. Serving as a Rectangle guard was a death sentence, as sure as stealing a prim'ta was.

Still, only the System Lords of the old guard were willing to spend the resources needed to keep everything in while the younger ones were content with simply not entering it.

Zarin, too, considered staying outside of the Rectangle a spectacularly good idea. Millennia ago, when the Tok'ra were still young, many ships had tried to find out what Ra and the System Lords hid there. They should have been wiser.

All the defenses pointed IN after all. None of the crews ever came back, depriving the resistance of many good people.

Now, with Ra's domain in disarray, it would be easier to return from there, as she had heard rumors of ships making it back to the lines, only to be destroyed by the defenses as their crews thought they had brought the horrors of the Rectangle with them... but that assumed anything made it back to Ra's defense lines. Which was less than probable, all things considered, and only reduced it from ridiculously unlikely to mindbogglingly unlikely.

Moloc's former territory was where she would send the scouts into Ra's domain, as the enchanters had ensured her the network in this area had holes big enough to enter and leave unnoticed. The latter causing even her to be concerned. Yes, anyone she would send there would probably die. But if they survived... it was a gamble to send agents, but it was also an opportunity, and disobeying Ba'al was not a good thing to do now he was watching her region so closely.

**Gate area**

**MP3X-403**

**March 14, 2157**

"So we get them low tech gadgets and they mine Naquadah and Trinium for us while we may mine the rich unclaimed deposit on north continent?" Middleton queried "Isn't that a bit unfair? Not that I'd mind, of course." He grinned.

Tamara Jagellovsk, the representative of the Colonial Bureau, raised her eyebrows. "We are not ripping them off, Sergeant. It's simply that they can understand compasses, mirrors and a few machined hand tools better than a perscomp. Plus, they can honor their ancestors by providing material for the fight against the Goa'uld, and we also had to promise to look out for Ujatklun slaves on other worlds once they heard of their existence. The Nolar clan was adamant in its offers to help free them... and in promising to kill us if our actions damage them." inwardly, she sighed. This wannabe-womanizer was bad enough, but having the team's CO and language experts so passionately concerned over the natives' rights was a pain in the ass. Not that she wanted to stripmine the planet – the damage done to Terra itself had been enough to make sure doing anything remotely comparable on another garden world was a political death sentence. And it was even more expensive than just mining asteroids, so no one considered that idea.

"That was the clan with the invisible leather?"

"Transparent, yes."

"A shame they only use it to show off their scars." Middleton smiled, letting his gaze wander over her body.

Jagellovsk chose to ignore it, she had been warned that the driver wasn't the most pleasant company if he didn't have a grav vehicle to pilot or play around with. She sent him a deadly glare he immediately interpreted right and chose as a hint to back off, happy to see that Littlefield's return allowed him to climb back into the cockpit and power up the carrier without losing face.

It wasn't as if there weren't hundreds of groupies for each member of an SG-team, after all, and most of them didn't care _which_ member it was, with the obvious exception of the guys from the first trip. Most of them didn't get baskets full of proposals in the mail like Lance Corporal Singh, "Slayer of Ra", but entering a bar while wearing the gold-on-black insignia always ended in a successful evening without having to pay for drinks. You only had to ignore the kind of girl that would run to the next journalist afterwards. Being a publicly acknowledged war hero definitely had its advantages.

**Sol, about Saturn Orbit**

**March 30, 2157**

Spacetime protested as the mighty Ha'tak forced its way into real space. It bathed the inner system in subspace scanner energy to get precision navigational and target data before opening another subspace window for the next short trip.

**Same time,**

**Tel'tac Hangar, Terra Space control, Phoenix, Texas**

As soon as the hyperspace window collapsed, the ancient tel'tac's sensors noticed the visitor – and identified Ra's IFF code. As the unchanged system marked the ship as friendly, the sensor watch officer immediately raised an alert.

The only positive thing about this was that Stephen Hawking Station on Enceladus was on the other side of Saturn as the ship arrived, he thought.

**Bridge, TCS Pegasus**

**Terran High Orbit**

Suddenly, klaxons sounded all over the ship. "This is HQ. A Goa'uld ship just entered the system at Saturn orbit. This is a planetary defense emergency, code Omega. This is not a drill. I repeat. This is HQ…"

"This is the captain speaking. We have a Code Omega. All hands, general quarters." Even before he was finished speaking, alert systems bathed the bridge in red lights and Commander McRay called up systems status on his HUD, checking his attack cruiser's readiness and watching department after department declaring clear for battle .

Within a minute, all stations were manned and ready, fighters were already leaving the hangars, forming up to provide extra point defense and everything looked right. Switching to orbital defense, he found Terra well prepared. Outside, thousands of ships from 400 dTon Patrol ships to 50,000 dTon Battlecruisers arranged in their standard squadrons, forming a defensive wall and launching thousands of fighters while the dozens of defense satellites orbiting on the "right" side of Terra powered up their heavy particle cannons, with large red cylinders marking where their guns where pointed right now and lighter ones showing the stations' intended course corrections to avoid friendly fire incidents as they moved to target the expected hyperspace window location.

Then, another series of cylinders appeared in his view as the planetary defense cannons fed their firing solutions into the FleetNet, causing another series of maneuvers to clear their firing corridors.

An icon in the lower left represented the status of the Army who was now scrambling its grav tank divisions to enter the fight if necessary.

"Sitrep!"

"Global Defense Net is at full capacity and readiness, Home Fleet is in defense positions, all fighters scrambled. Civilian ships are being rerouted to Luna or ordered to land at the closest space port. The enemy just opened another hyperspace window and is expected to arrive in orbit in under three minutes."

It felt like three days until the Ha'tak reappeared in normal space and immediately transmitted on all channels. "I am Jer'get, prime in the domain of your god Ra. You will bow before your god or die for your insolence."

**Pel'tak**

**Ha'tak Chu'alahk**

Silence filled the aether for a moment before another voice answered in low Goa'uld. "Jer'get, you are violating Terran space. Stand down or be destroyed."

With a growl, Jer'get ordered the Deathgliders to launch. Dozens of the craft raced towards the obscenely industrialized world while the bigger ship moved closer.

**Terran orbit**

The gliders where well on their way to Terra when they crossed an invisible line. Suddenly, dozens of Terran fighters opened fire on the Gliders, reducing them to smoking debris in the initial volley before the deathgliders had even come close to their own weapons range. The Ha'tak approached Earth until it was in the perfect position. All of a sudden, its rear shields flared up as they took fire from several lunar installations. Simultaneously, every military platform and ship that had a weapon long-ranged enough as well as a firing angle on the Goa'uld ship, from lowly corvettes to mighty dreadnoughts – barely the size of two Al'Kesh - opened up as one.

As the Ha'tak came closer, even more weapons entered the fray. Hundreds of particle cannons and thousands of modern military x-ray laser guns all concentrated their fire on the Ha'tak's shields as it came closer and entered their respective ranges, while the sky was filled with thousands of missiles, many of them nuclear.

Some ships had even fired their sandcasters in the desperate hope that the particles could disrupt and weaken the Goa'uld shots, even if they were only designed to weaken LASER fire.

**Hero-class private merchant Beowulf,**

**Bridge **

"Bow before your god? Who the hell does that asshole think he is?!" Frederic Raffarin, Captain of the small freighter bellowed angrily. Someone in the Terran datanet had distributed a basic Goa'uld translator, and as the software was free, most free traders now had a copy buried somewhere in their ship computers. You never knew who you would meet while looking for customers, after all.

Then he saw a dreadnought and a cruiser crumple under plasma hits, while a second cruiser evaded, allowing the bolt to pass through.. "Johnny, ready the LASERs. I won't allow some alien megalomaniac to destroy Terra. Again. With ONE SHIP!"

"Phoenix requested we stay clea... SIR! There's a titanic explosion in Australia... Oh my god... It destroyed Sydney!"

Silence filled the ship as everyone aboard stared at the mushroom cloud rising from Australia, and the Tsunami spreading through the Pacific, soon replaced by sensor footage. Cruiser wreckage, the remains of a tanker that had been only a kilometer above the city as it had been hit, was tumbling down. Just before the impact, a missile battery came into view. Then, hundreds of tons of fuel and dozens of missiles detonated, destroying the city utterly.

"Fire..." Raffarin whispered, still shocked, for a moment standing before what had been left over of his house in Marseille, after the Algiers wave had crossed the Mediterranean. A moment later, his ship turned towards the Ha'tak and opened fire with its vintage rainbow LASERs of the type tickled down to free traders and other civilian starships not expected to operate in imperial space.

But it was only a small part of the giant armada of civilian and corporate ships joining in. Every armed construct in Terran or Lunar orbit opened fire at the Ha'tak, the sheer size of the ship, let alone the shield bubble, as well as the fact that it did not maneuver unexpectedly, making it an easy target for even the worst gunner.

While only the military ships were coordinated by the planetary supercomputers, the sheer volume of fire slowly started to take its toll. Finally, not even the shield bubble, which slowly rotated to prevent enemy fire from concentrating on one spot for too long, saved the ship.

**Pel'tak Ha'tak Chu'alahk**

Gulping, Jer'get gasped at his readouts, seeing how his shield strength dropped every second as the reactors were unable to provide enough power to keep them online. Not even the ease with which the unshielded enemy ships and gun stations could easily be destroyed with single hits helped much, as there were simply too many small, maneuverable targets as well as a constant rain of nuclear missiles… Wondering why in Sokar's burning garden he couldn't exchange rate of fire for hitting power with his guns, he suddenly found himself given a good shaking.

The shield strength dropped another .1% at once. "What the fuck was that?!" he heard an officer yell, then he replayed the footage. Apparently, a small fighter had just kept accelerating after having already gained significant speed from a carrier, using the momentum to fire a canister full of tiny particles onto his shields. As he was still flying towards the planet, it hit like a naquada-enhanced nuke. Soon after the fighter crashed into Chu'alahk's shields, and before he could do any more than stare at the screen, the sheer amount of weapon hits finally proved too much. The shield generator overloaded, and the big ship died in a storm of rainbow LASER light, coherent x-rays, plasma bolts, nuclear explosions and particle fire.

But still, it had destroyed much of the orbital defense grid and wiped out a significant portion of Home Fleet in less than ten minutes.

**Bridge, TCS Pegasus**

All lights went dark, and the klaxons died as a sudden storm appeared on the bridge. There had been a malfunction in all the bridge's combat decompression systems, so Pegasus had gone into battle with air in its command centre. Thankfully, navy Uniforms doubled as lightly armored emergency vacc suits and they _had_ had the time to don helmet and gloves while strapping themselves down. Still, any lose object was rushing out of the bridge until the bulkheads finally closed.

"Sitrep! What do we still have? "

"Sir, Starbord side is… gone. It's just not there any more." Silence. On the main screen, a schematic view of the 10,000 dTon attack cruiser appeared, showing a full 40% of its width missing, and red lights blinking all over what remained of the ship.

"My god…" McRay whispered, stopping mid-sentence, as the screen showed the invader exploding

before a small Lightning class merchant with a white star emblem tumbled through the picture.

"Engineering, give me a Damage report. How come we're still alive?"

"It was only a grazing shot, sir. They nearly missed us and that's the result…" his XO answered, staring at the damage control screen.

The schematics showed that thrusters 4 and 5 were completely and utterly gone, while 3 was wrecked, limiting the ship to a safe acceleration of 2G… The starboard hangar was simply gone, jump drive inoperable, several weapon systems simply gone… The only good part of that was that the lost power plants weren't needed anymore as the systems they normally fed had been lost. But they were alive, and that was more than most other ships hit could say.

"Holy shit. Engineering, give me some power. We have to look for the life pods."

As the once proud Galaxy class Attack cruiser limped towards the first beacon, Captain McRay studied the ship's ID. It was the Orion, a fast cruiser that would have never survived even a glancing hit. Sighing inwardly, he realized that this ship had probably been hit by debris from the Pegasus.

**Giza, Pyramids**

**Egypt, Terra**

**Ten days after the battle for Terra**

Sydney would not get an own memorial, for there already was one fitting for this cause.

Spaced around the pyramids, a dozen statues had been erected. A dozen meters high, each of them represented a warrior clad in layered linen and pointing their spears at the pyramids. Closer to the pyramids, a number of smaller Horus Guards were running towards the entrance.

Below one of the statues, three big daises had been erected, the central one holding the flag of every Terran and offworld nation, even holding the flags of all the colonies – the flag of Nusku representing a former imperial world here for the first time. It also flew the flags of the Abydonian Commonwealth and the Oannes Coalition, the former using a Mastadge head and three moons on green, the latter using a holographic symbol projected into the air.

The seats on the dais held the Secretary-General, the whole Advisory Board, the leaders of all Terran armed forces, ambassadors from the Oannes and Abydos.

The daises left and right held the Terran Orchestra and Chorus, while long rows of seats held journalists, dignitaries and the families of the fallen, all clad in their service uniforms if old enough.

As soon as the Secretary-General and other main guests approached the central dais, Chorus and Orchestra began to play the Anthem, the Ode to Joy strangely fitting to the procession while five squadrons of Rocs dived down from orbit, showing their respect to the dead by flying over the site low enough to be seen, but slow enough not to silence the chorus. They were followed by the surviving members of squadrons the fallen ships had belonged to, from lowly corvette to mighty dreadnought, all practically crawling through the air, mostly held up by counterthrust.

On the giant holoscreen behind the Secretary-General, thousands of soldiers clad in combat dress were seen marching in parade formation below the Martian flag over John Carter Base, companies of G-Carriers and grav tanks serenely floating behind them, about a meter above the red sands.

High above them in Martian orbit, troop transports left Utopia Planitia Station, opening their jump hatches and allowing additional soldiers to jump out, land onto the parade grounds and form up at the back of the marching column.

As the last sounds of the anthem faded out, the parade was finished and the last of the dreadnoughts made for orbit, firing all of their guns in a last salute, the Secretary-General, who had been standing behind the pedestal while this display of power finished raised his voice.

"Eight years." the masses quieted. "It has been eight years since we last stood here, and my predecessor opened this memorial to the nuclear death of Algiers, Cape Town, Vladivostok and Los Angeles. Now, we stand here again, remembering the loss of Sydney. And yet, we sing about Joy." he looked into the audience, then facing the camera, his speech being transmitted by gate, by subspace comm and by courier once it had been finished. For now, the ceremony was only taking place at any world reachable by radio or a single jump from either Terra or the next subspace comm, no other knowing of the events yet, working on clocks running on Terran time.

"As a world, we have not felt true joy for decades. We have been at the brink of destruction, and experienced a survivor's joy. We experienced a conqueror's joy. Still, the simple joy of living without war, doing what we want to do, is denied to us." he let his gaze wander over the people congregated before him."The last time, we only survived because the enemy was distracted. This time, we actually won. This is something we can be proud about, something inspiring joy. But still, we are at war. We paid a heavy price, but we stood our ground. It was one ship, and we were likes flames in the rain, but they died, and Terra still lives. And we will strike.

"The Goa'uld System Lords, masquerading themselves as gods, enslave untold millions all over the galaxy. The Goa'uld are parasites, using their slaves like cattle. We will not stand for that. An envoy is en route to the Ziru Sirka as of now, to inform the local ruler about the danger. Make no mistake, we will not defend the imperial border with any less might than before. But we now will build up to be able to concentrate our efforts elsewhere while doing so.

"Thirty years ago, the first man to wear the title I wear now, Kanshi Bannerjee, said this to a Terra that faced the First Interstellar War." Montalva said, then replayed a recording of his predecessor's words, the old man's voice crisply cutting through the silence.

"_One world. One world set against an empire of thousands._

_One lone world set against trillions of Human and alien beings who do not share our history, any of our cultures, or any of our values._

_Victory seems impossible. Perhaps the best we can expect is survival._

_Yet to achieve even that, we must be . . . one world."_

Montalva looked up, starting to speak again. "He was right. And he was completely wrong at the same time. Yes, Terra has and had to be one world to survive.

"But we are more. We were already more back then. In the face of alien parasites enslaving humans all over the galaxy, we can no longer afford to be one world. When meeting false gods, it is not enough to be a single world.

"We are people of Terra. But we are of Mars. We are of Luna. We are of Loki. We are of Ember. We are of Junction. We even are of Nusku. People from all over the Confederation, from worlds new and ancient, some even foreigners, died ten days ago to protect us. The man that dared a kamikaze attack to save us all was from Hephaistos. And yet, we sit here, 200 votes for Terra, a dozen for everyone else, calling this equality. This will change.

It will change like the way we look into the sky changed. It changed more often, and in vastly more rapid succession, than in all of recorded history.

A mere hundred years ago, space changed from an unreachable void we could only dream of to new pastures, ripe to be grabbed by us, to be used as we wished.

Thirty years ago, we saw the Ziru Sirka, a powerful enemy, but yet human.

Now, we see chains. We see millennia of slavery, of humans being cattle. We see blood, humans thrown away as cannon fodder.

But." his voice grew stronger "We also see fear. We see our ancestors driving off the mighty 'gods' Millennia ago, forcing them to hide in the stars."

With a fierce voice, he looked up. "This is the second reason we built this monument. The time of hiding is nearing an end. We have two of their ships, we have allies and we will we have the materials we need to catch up.

But we cannot afford to have the seed of rebellion, an obvious cause of discontent in our middle.

Ladies and Gentlemen, look into the stars. Can you sleep at night, knowing of the System Lords' slavery and knowing that we treat the colonies like Europe did it to its colonies a quarter Millennium ago? Don't we claim to be better than that? Let us be better than that.

"And here, we come back to our anthem. 'All men become brothers'.

"Yes. Let us become brothers. Let us become one. Set aside the rivalries. Set aside the strife. Set aside the calls for personal power.

In the 2150s, the Public Service Slogan was 'We all go where Terra needs us to be.' In the 60s, the slogan will be 'We all go where mankind needs us be.'

"We are not only citizens of Terra, Prometheus, Hephaistos, Agidda, Nusku, Barnard, Junction or any other world. We are humans.

We hear our brothers and sisters cry out in anguish, and we say ENOUGH.

"Our ancestors drove off Ra millennia ago. Corporal Singh killed him 2157, for which he got the Great Star of Terra.

Now, his servants came back, trying to break us by killing millions. This was their mistake."

Everyone at the memorial was silent, waiting for the next bomb to drop, a declaration he had already created the correct environment for. In the upper right corner of his glasses' HUD, a single graph from New York showed his global approval rating skyrocketing.

"I, Secretary-General Eduardo Montalva, on behalf of the Terran Confederation and in agreement with both Advisory Board and General Assembly, hereby declare war on the Goa'uld System Lords. It will be many years until we can hop to strike back. But it is time to rearm, rebuild and retrain. As of now, war economy is reinstated. It is time for Terra to prepare."

As he finished his speech, factories all over Sol received new orders, sending out messages informing their civilian customers that their projects had been lowered in priority and, as a result, would be vastly delayed.

Army and Navy support personnel became new orders, reserve units reactivated for training and new people were drafted. It would be years to actual combat outside of the Confederation, but a new military buildup was underway, and the short breathing pause between wars and war economies was over. Universities all over the planet became orders to detach teachers, sending them to courses in preparation of new curricula, and many an expert of ancient history was drafted to a military academy to teach about goa'uld-influenced cultures.

**Uncharted system, Ouollou Subsector, Khoelighz Sector, Vargr Extents – Death Rectangle**

**March 30, 2157**

While the mighty Ha'tak futilely fought for its life above Terra, other probing actions into the Death Rectangle proved more successful.

In a marginal system at the edges of charted space, one of Ba'al's scout tel'tacs watched another ship like nothing its inhabitants had ever seen before while an Al'Kesh waited for their data.

A single vessel looking like a sleek aquatic predator with spines had just left the depths of the local gas giant, a maneuver that stupefied its watchers for its uselessness combined with high risks, and now made for the single planet with signs of habitation at a leisurely 3Gs of acceleration, aiming straight for the orbital station housing another vessel of comparable build.

There was only a small amount of Naquadah, consistent with a boosted fusion power plant which could be found anywhere in the system, but not a single sign of anything subspace based or with large scale Naquadah use as would be expected from Goa'uld, Asgard or Ancient craft – they only used trinium alloy hulls. And the strangeness didn't stop there, as the inhabitants of planet, ships and station were of unknown race, but showed distinct Tau'ra readings regardless.

The ship they were watching would, at it's current acceleration, need a few more days before it arrived at the station, and after checking its course for deadly traps, the Al'Kesh was about to make its presence known.

Suddenly, a subspace window opened in front of the unknown ship, spitting out an Al'Kesh that immediately opened a comm. channel.

"You will stand down and bow for your god Ba'al."

The reaction was not the one expected, as the translated voice – which, strangely, had some canine underpinnings - answered "Wow, nice ship and a good entrance. Looks sneaky and fast, seems to pack a nice punch if the sensors are any indication and looks like it can take a beating while storing a lot of loot… Are you in need of a new crewman?"

While the Al'Kesh crew just shared utterly confused looks, an angry howl filled the comm. channel, followed by a gunshot. "No one changes crew just now! Tell this Ba'al fellow we're raiding the Khakaengkfae at the moment, and if you play nice we won't redirect our attention to him."

"That… that is blasphemy! You will bow before the mighty System Lord Ba'al!"

"Blasphemy? Guy really thinks he's some kind of god? Seriously, why didn't you get rid of the maniac yet? That can't possibly be good for business! And he's even unimaginative. 'System Lord'. Tsktsk. What a waste of a fine starship!"

This was enough, and this time, the plasma cannons opened up at the alien ship, which dodged them, supported by gravity generators pushing the bolts away under computer control while returning fire with six lances of coherent x-rays eating away the shield while six missiles were fired towards the Al'Kesh. A moment later, one plasma shot connected to the ship's hull and disabled the power plant as well as the drives.

Immediately, Jaffa soldiers were transported over to salvage the wreck and its crew, of which only one had survived. After the shield had recharged and the cargo bays filled, the Goa'uld ships made their way to the other two installations.

Shortly afterwards, the system was stripped of any aliens and their technology, leaving it as empty as it had been for untold eons before the people that had just been killed or abducted had appeared while the two Goa'uld ships were back on their way back to their God's domain.

**Initial survey results**

**March 2157**

**Part 1: Arcturus Subsector**

First scans of the sector have proven to be disappointing, but cover only two out of the three mains while ignoring six worlds reachable by jump-2. Still, the three asteroid belts and eight gas giant discovered will prove critical for industrial development without Abydonian interests in the game.

The worlds surveyed as of March 2157 are:

**2528 Arcturus**

This system only consists of a M8 V star with three gas giants and their moons. It is not worth to receive more than fortifications and a refueling station.

**2729 Arcturus**

This is a binary system consisting of a M4 V main and its M6 V companion. It holds three gas giant systems and a single notable planet with a poisonous atmosphere and 1.15Gs. Not usable as a colony.

**2628 Arcturus**

The systems consists of a G3 V star, two gas giants and a single terrestrial world with roughly 81% of Terra's diameter, a thin, but breathable atmosphere, 82% surface water and a single, small moon.

Located only a single jump away from Ra's Demise between 2528 and 2729, this system is to be considered prime real estate. The General Assembly has already received petitions to found a neodolphin colony there, and renting parts of it to the Oannes.

Still, in depth surveys have to be done first.

**2527 Arcturus**

This system consists of a M1 V main star accompanied by a M8 V star and a white dwarf. It possesses three gas giant systems as well as a potentially habitable world about 13% larger than Terra with 41% of its surface covered in water.

An in-system survey is strongly suggested.

**2626 Arcturus**

This system is a M3 V orbited by three gas giant systems a single jump-2 from Ra's Demise.

2528, 2628, 2729, 2626 and 2527 form the main closest to existing Confederation space, and it can be argued that Ra's Demise is part of this main. Furthermore, a star system at jump-2 from 2729 was already identified.

Colonization or at least extensive fortification of all these systems against the Ziru Sirka is strongly suggested.

The second main consists of 2928, 3028, 3029 and 3130, with another system a jump-2 away.

**2928 Arcturus**

This system consists of a G3 V star and its M7 V companion. There are two gas giant systems and two belts.

What makes it most relevant to confederated endeavors is a single Terran-type world roughly the size of Terra, with 90% of its surface area covered with water, and a breathable atmosphere. This means the world is ripe for colonization.

CLASSIFIED: Explorers picked up strange energy readings from a northern ocean during first survey. First real survey by the Navy is already in its planning stages.

**3028 Arcturus**

This is a M4 V with a gas giant system, two belts and a roughly Terra-sized world. The planet has a tainted atmosphere and 52% of its surface area is covered with water. It is a viable possible colony.

**3029 Arcturus**

A K8 V with two gas giant systems, an asteroid belt and a world with roughly three quarters Terra's diameter, a dense atmosphere, 70% surface water and a large moon. It is a viable possible colony.

**3130 Arcturus**

This system consists of a F1 V with a M2 V companion, three giants and two belts.

The third main only barely qualifies, consisting of only of 3127 and 3026.

**3127 Arcturus**

This system consists of an orange dwarf with three gas giant systems and a belt. While it offers no colony world, it possesses plenty of raw materials. Being only a single jump away from the Commonwealth, it has a potentially strategic position, though.

As a result, the Commonwealth has already claimed it.

**3026 Arcturus**

This system consists of a single G0 V with two giants and a world two thirds the diameter of Terra but with 92% of its surface covered in oceans.

**3024 Arcturus**

This system consists of a M4 V and four giants, as well as a habitable world of about 90% Terra's diameter with about a third of it covered on oceans. As it is only a jump-2 away from both Abydos and 3026, the Commonwealth already claimed this system.

**3221 Arcturus**

This system consists of A5 V star and a white dwarf plus three giants and holds no habitable planets.

Using jump drive, this system can only be reached via the Abydos main.

**Part 2: The Abydos Main**

As requested by the Commonwealth, this is an early stage survey of the main Abydos is located on. It consists of three systems other than Abydos, these systems are part of the Denobula Subsector, Alpha Crucis Sector, and leads towards 3221 Arcturus.

Nevertheless, this main is not promising.

**0125 Alpha Crucis**

This system consists of a K6 V with three giants and a belt. It is located a single Jump-1 from Abydos to trailing.

**0124 Alpha Crucis**

This system consists of a M1 V with five giants, a belt and a single rocky planet with a diameter 82% greater than Terra's. It is located a Jump-2 from Abydos.

**0123 Alpha Crucis**

This system consists of a M6 IV with a white dwarf companion and four giants. It is located a jump-2 from both 3221 Arcturus and another main further coreward.

**A/N: **The Solomani Confederation, the state that covered Terra before the Imperium conquered it in the middle of the 6th millennium, had Ode to Joy as its anthem and modeled itself after the Terran Confederation, so the anthem is pretty much set.

The stuff he quotes/plays actually consist of quotes from the sourcebook.

The Unas surely don't call themselves "the first hosts". Being without a neckguard in public is about as accepted as being topless in public in America.

As the ground battle was a curbstomp in favor of Terra, here's the balance. They're in a whole other league of technology in space.


End file.
